
Class M(o D 



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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



OF THE 

AMERICAN ACADEMY OF 
POLITICAL AND SOCIAL SCIENCE 



International 
Reconstruction 



Philadelphia 
36th Street AND Woodland Avenue 



^.LXXXIV 



JULY, 1919 



No. 173 



THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF POLITICAL 
AND SOCIAL SCIENCE 

Origin and Purpose. The Academy was organized December 14, 
1889, to provide a national forum for the discussion of political and social 
questions. The Academy does not take sides upon controverted ques- 
tions, but seeks to secure and present reliable information to assist the 
public in forming an intelligent and accurate opinion. 

Publications. The Academy publishes annually six issues of its 
"Annals" dealing with the six most prominent current social and politi- 
cal problems. Each publication contains from twenty to twenty-five 
papers upon the same general subject. The larger number of the papers 
published are solicited by the Academy; they are serious discussions, 
not doctrinaire expressions of opinion. 

Meetings. The Academy holds five scientific sessions each year 
during the winter months, and it also has an annual meeting in April, ex- 
tending over two full days and including six sessions. The papers of 
permanent value presented at the meetings are included in the Academy 
publications. 

Membership. The subscription price erf THE ANNALS of the 
American Academy of Political and Social Science is $6.00 per year. 
Single copies are sold at $1.00 each. THE ANNALS are sent to all 
members of the Academy, $4.00 (or more) of the annual membership 
fee of $5.06 being for a subscription to the publication. Membership 
in the Academy may be secured by applying to the Secretary, 36th 
Street and Woodland Avenue, Philadelphia. The membership fee is 
$5.00; life membership fee, $100. Members not only receive all the 
regular publications of the Academy, but are also invited to attend and 
take part in the scientific meetings, and have the privilege of appljring 
to the Editorial Council for information upon current political and social 
questions. 

Issued Bi-Monthly by the American Academy of Political and Social Science at Concord, 
New HaTitpshire. 

Editorial Office, Woodland Avenue and 36th Street, Philadelphia. 

Entered at second-dast matter May 8, l&iS, at the post-office at Coneord, New Hampakixe, under the 

Ad of August Bi,imS. 



©C!,B438n86 

JUL !i \m 



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INTERNATIONAL RECONSTRUCTION 



Ws^t %xmS& 



Volume LXXXIV 



July, 1919 




Editor: CLYDE L. KING 

Assistant Editor: C. H. CRENNAN 

Associate Editor: H. W. DODDS 

Editorial Council: THOMAS CONWAY, Jr., A. A. GIESIECKE, A. R. HATTON, AMOS S. 

HERSHEY, E. M. HOPKINS, S. S. HUEBNER, CARL KELSEY, J. P. LICHTEN- 

BERGER, ROSWELL C. McCREA, E. M. PATTERSON, L. S. ROWE, 

HENRY SUZZALO, T. W. VAN METRE, F. D. WATSON, 

JOSEPH H. WILLITS 

Editor in Charge of this Volume: 
CARL KELSEY, Ph.D. 




The American Academy of Political and Social Science 

36th Street and Woodland Avenue 

Philadelphia 

1919 







oby ^ 







Copyright, 1919, by 

The American Academy of Political and Social Science 

All rights reserved 



EUROPEAN AGENTS 

England: P. S. King & Son, Ltd., 2 Great Smith Street, Westminster, London, S. W, 

France: L. Larose, Rue Soufflot, 22, Paris. 

Germ;ant: Mayer & Miiller, 2 Prinz Louis Ferdinandstrasse, Berlin, N. W. 

Italy: Giornale Degli Economisti, via Monte Savello, Palazzo Orsini, Rome. 

Spain: E. Dossat, 9 Plaza de Santa Ana, Madrid. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

FOREWORD V 

Editor in Charge of Volume. 

PART I— THE FUTURE OF TURKEY AND ASIA MINOR 
PROBLEMS IN THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE 1 

Hon. Abram I. Elkus, Ambassador of the United States to Turkey. 
THE FUTURE OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE 6 

Henry Wynans Jessup, Esq., New York. 
THE TURKS AND THE FUTURE OF THE KEAR EAST 30 

Morris Jastrow, Jr., Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania. 
THE DISPOSITION OF THE TUHKISH EMPIRE 41 

Talcott Williams, LL.D., Director School of Journalism, Columbia University. 

PART II— READJUSTMENT IN MIDDLE EUROPE 
AN EYEWITNESS OF THE SERBIAN APOTHEOSIS 51 

Madame Slavko Y. Grouitch, Serbia. 
AN EXPERIMENT IN PROGRESSIVE GOVERNMENT— THE CZECHa 

SLOVAK REPUBLIC 58 

Hon. Charles Pergler, Commissioner of the Czechoslovak Republic in the 
United States. 
RECONSTRUCTION AMONG THE SMALL NATIONS OF MIDDLE EUROPE 64 
Stephen P. Duggan, Ph.D., College of the City of New York. 

A DANUBIAN CONFEDERATION OF THE FUTURE 70 

V. R. Savic, Former Head of the Press Bureau in the Serbian Foreign Office; 
Author of South Eastern Europe. 

PART III— THE PRESENT AND FUTURE OF RUSSIA 

RUSSIA— PRESENT AND FUTURE 81 

R. M. Story, Ph.D., International Committee of Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciations. 

THE RUSSIAN TRAGEDY 90 

W. C. Huntington, Commercial Attache, Formerly of the American Embassy, 
Petrograd, now in charge of Russian Division, United States Department of 
Commerce. 

THE MENACE OF BOLSHEVISM 98 

Baron Rosen, Former Ambassador of Russia to the United States. 

DEMOCRACY AND BOLSHEVISM 102 

A. J. Sack, Director of the Russian Information Bureau of the United States. 

THE SOVIET REPUBLIC 108 

Santeri Nuorteva, Secretary of the Representative in the United States of the 
Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic. 



iv Contents 

THE INTELLIGENTZIA AND THE PEOPLE IN THE RUSSIAN REVOLU- 
TION 114 

Moissaye J. Olgin, Ph.D., New York. 

ECONOMIC FORCE AND THE RUSSIAN PROBLEM 121 

Thomas D. Thacher, Member of the Amercian Red Cross Commission to Russia. 

SOCL\L CONTROL IN RUSSIA TODAY 127 

Colonel Raymond Robins, Member of the American Red Cross Commission to 
Russia. 

PART IV— THE ORGANIZATION OF PEACE 

FOREWORD 146 

The Rt. Hon. Lord Bryce. 

A. Economic and Political Reconstruction. 

THE ECONOMIC ORGANIZATION OF PEACE 147 

Hon. Samuel J. Graham, Assistant Attorney General of the United States. 

WANTED— A FOREIGN TRADE POLICY 152 

John Hays Hammond, LL.D., Washington, D. C. 

THE FREEDOM OF THE SEAS 161 

John H. Latan6, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University. 
THE NEED OF SOCIAL REORGANIZATION IN AMERICA 171 

Oswald Garrison Villard, Editor of The Nation. 

B. The League of Nations. 

THE AMENDED COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 177 

Thomas Raeburn White, Esq., Philadelphia. 
AMERICA, THE NATIONS AND THE LEAGUE 194 

Hon. Thomas R. Marshall, Vice-President of the United States. 
IN DEFENSE OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS COVENANT 201 

Hon. Gilbert M. Hitchcock, Committee on Foreign Relations, United States 
Senate. 
WANTED— A LEAGUE OF NATIONS LIKELY TO PROMOTE PEACE... 208 

George Wharton Pepper, Esq., Philadelphia. 
PEACE AND DEMOCRACY 215 

Hon. Samuel W. McCall, formerly Governor of Massachusetts. 
INDEX 219 



FOREWORD 

The war which broke out in 1914 created a revolution in the 
attitude of Americans. This revolution was not merely the result 
of our active participation in the war on the soil of Europe, but 
involved likewise immense changes in our thoughts. Barring 
the comparatively few who have come from Syria, I presume most 
Americans thought of Syria in terms of foreign missions. We 
knew something of the educational work which had been done in 
various countries, but it all seemed apart from our life. After 
four years of conflict the world now seems very small to us. The 
statements which come to us have been so diverse and conflicting 
that it has been impossible to get a clear vision. Nevertheless, 
we are conscientiously endeavoring to interpret what has taken 
place and we are striving to know what existing conditions are. 

In planning for this volume the above facts were kept in mind 
and the officers of the Academy sought to obtain first-hand testi- 
mony from competent and trustworthy observers who have had 
exceptional opportunity to know the conditions about which they 
write. Each man speaks for himself and the viewpoints repre- 
sented in this volume will be found to be quite divergent. This 
indicates perhaps that the different observers have seen things from 
different angles and thus their various accounts may blend to pro- 
duce a more harmonious and complete picture in our own minds. 
It is believed they will be found worthy of careful consideration. 

One of the trouble spots on the earth for the last century has 
been the district about the eastern Mediterranean. If some 
solution can be found which will make it possible for the peoples 
of this region to adopt a civilization which will correspond to the 
opportunities offered by nature, it will be a blessing to the world. 
The final development of this country, moreover, would make it 
easier to work out some basis of harmony in the tangled situation 
which confronts us in mid-Europe. Probably no one believes 
that the Slavic states will fail in the long run to find some basis of 



vi The Annals of the American Academy 

union. This will in turn make possible peace and prosperity in 
the great Danube valley. 

Russia is a mystery; none the less interesting and fascinating 
because so mysterious. Reports with reference to conditions in 
Russia are so divergent, the judgments of observers vary so 
greatly, that our final judgment must be suspended until the 
scene clears somewhat. The form of government adopted by the 
Russians is primarily their own concern. The principles, how- 
ever, which animate that government in its dealings with the 
rest of the world are matters of no little importance to us here. 

Lack of space prohibits consideration of other areas of the earth 
where conditions are today unsettled. 

The fourth part of the present volume deals with a very dif- 
ferent type of questions, but they are all questions growing out 
of the interrelations of nations. How our industries are to be 
organized; how our foreign trade policies are to be developed; 
how the control of the sea is to be maintained; are matters of no 
little concern to us all. The last section presents careful con- 
sideration of the League of Nations as now proposed. Whether 
or not the constitution, as outlined at Versailles, is ideal, is not the 
main question. The big question is, I take it, whether or not it 
is a workable compromise. Our own American Constitution is 
highly exalted. Yet when it was adopted it satisfied very few 
people and the change of a handful of votes in states like Penn- 
sylvania and New York would have defeated it. The courts 
have found it possible to introduce elements not contained in the 
written document. In spite of the great changes in conditions 
in the United States our experience has shown us that it proves 
the basis for substantial and harmonious adjustment. All the 
details of the plan proposed at Versailles are not known. When 
they are it is obviously the duty of our government to consider 
them most carefully to determine whether or not we should bind 
ourselves to accept them. The papers here presented both sup- 
port and criticize the plan now outlined. 

The editor in charge believes that the papers will be found 
deserving of careful consideration by all who are seeking to obtain 
information on these great current problems. He believes that 
by the publication of such a volume the Academy justifies its 



Foreword vii 

existence. The Academy as such has no viewpoint on any ques- 
tion, but it seeks to secure men of the best thought and widest 
experience who can give the rest of us the benefit of their informa- 
tion. The members of the Academy owe the contributors a great 
debt of thanks for their generous participation in the Academy 
work. 

Carl Kelsey. 



Problems in the Reconstruction of the Ottoman 

Empire 

By Hon. Abram I. Elkus 

Ambassador of the United States to Turkey 

TT is a matter of deep concern — this story of the Ottoman 
^ Empire and what is to become of that country — ^not only to 
us who Hve in America, but to all the world, at least to all the 
civilized or European world, because during the past two cen- 
turies, if not longer, every European war has had its origin or its 
cause in that Ottoman Empire. Greed upon the part of one or 
more of the great European Powers for territory, or for some 
advantage or gain, has brought about this result, and I do not 
except this last war. 

History of the Turkish Domination 
When the Turk, hundreds of years ago, began his forward 
and ever victorious march from Central Asia westward, con- 
quering one nation after another, one people after another whose 
inferior he was in civilization and in all that goes to make up 
a great people, he swept over the following lands one by one: 
Egypt, Syria, Armenia, Palestine and Lebanon. He was not 
even halted by the Straits or by the Bosphorus, but finally crossed 
into Europe. Five hundred years ago, he drove from Con- 
stantinople the Greeks who had ruled there for hundreds of 
years. So successful was that onward march of the Ottoman 
Turk, so wonderful was the progress he made, that he came to the 
very doors of Vienna before he was finally stopped. Then, after 
centuries, there began the period of retrogression. The Turk, 
while he may be a conqueror, has failed signally to be a real 
administrator. He has failed to understand the theory or the 
practice of government — not only of his own people, but of those 
nations which he has conquered. So we find today that there 
live in what is known as the Ottoman Empire some 20,000,000 
people, among whom are nations within a nation, peoples within 
a people, countries within a country — people diverse in thought, 
in language, in ideas, in ideals, and in all that goes to make up a 
3 I 



2 The Annals of the American Academy 

nation. Probably about 5,000,000 are Ottoman Turks. The 
great majority have Httle or no education — ignorant, illiterate, 
mostly peasants or workingmen, simple-minded, peaceful, in- 
tensely superstitious and pious or religious. A few, perhaps a 
hundred thousand, are men of education, men of culture, men of 
refinement, men who possess the European manner and the Euro- 
pean education. These few thousands, until this war came, 
were the rulers of the land. They dominated the affairs of the 
country. They were the spokesmen of the Ottoman Empire. 
Between these two extremes of the Turks — between, on the one 
hand, these few thousands of men who held all the positions of 
trust in the government, and the Turkish peasant and workman 
at the other extreme — came all of the rest of the peoples of 
Turkey, the peoples whose ancestors made up the nations which 
Turkey conquered. Millions were Arabs who, like the Turks, 
were Moslem in their religious belief, but who had little or nothing 
to do with the Turks and seldom if ever intermarried with them. 
Millions were Greeks who still speak the Greek tongue. There 
were hundreds of thousands of Jews, some of whom spoke Span- 
ish, or a mixture of Spanish and Hebrew and Turkish. There 
were Lebanonites and Syrians, descendants of those peoples and 
nations over which the Turkish army swept; and then there were 
still probably a million, no one can tell exactly, perhaps a million 
and a half or two million, of those wonderful people who have 
withstood such persecutions and such outrages upon them during 
these past four years that one wonders when one hears the story 
that any remain alive to tell the tale — those Armenians who are 
said to be descended from the first of the pagan tribes which 
accepted the doctrines of Christ and who have suffered for it 
ever since. Part of Armenia, or what perhaps is real Armenia 
and in which there now live about 2,000,000 Armenians, was 
taken by Russia. It is what is called Russian Armenia. These 
peoples, other than the Moslem Turks of whom I have spoken, 
stand in between the two extremes of the Turks, and are in theory 
subject races. 

Strange to say, today there is what is called a liberal monarchy 
in Turkey. Until eight or nine years ago it was an absolute one, 
dominated by the Sultan. Even the Turk was unable to stand 
it longer, and there was almost a bloodless revolution during which 



Problems of the Ottoman Empire 3 

they deposed this absolute monarch and placed his elder brother 
upon the throne; and he ruled only in name until he died a few 
months ago. He has been succeeded by a younger brother, who 
now reigns by the permission of the great Powers of the world until 
it shall be decided what is to be the fate of the Ottoman Empire. 
The rulers of the land during this period were the members of 
the Cabinet. Then, gradually, the power came to be placed in 
the hands of two men of this Cabinet, men whose names are known, 
Enver and Talat — men who threw their fortunes into league with 
the Central Empires and who, as the war progressed and after 
Turkey entered the war in the fall of 1914, were but the agents 
of the German Emperor. They today are fugitives, and it is 
interesting to note that it is said that they have gone back to the 
original home of the Turk, to the far off country of Turkestan, 
whence the Turk centuries ago began his foray into the civilized 
world. There, according to the stories that the newspapers tell, 
these two men are preaching the doctrines of the majority, other- 
wise called bolshevism, and trying to arouse the people to begin a 
new campaign against the Ottoman Empire and the countries of 
that part of the world which we speak of as the Near East. 

With a land like that which I have indicated, with peoples of 
different religious beliefs, tongues and customs, there are, indeed, 
presented many problems for consideration. It is said that 
America has a great interest in that land, an interest which has 
been shown by our sending large numbers of missionaries there 
and creating and maintaining wonderful institutions of learning. 
But, to my thinking, our obligation is now to see that those peoples 
who are persecuted, downtrodden, oppressed, murdered and 
massacred, shall have that right to live in the sun as all men 
and women under God have a right to do. 

Constantinople 

Many plans are proposed. First, there is the great problem of 
what shall be done with that part of the Ottoman Empire which 
lies within the boundaries of Europe. There is the wonderful 
city of Constantinople with its fine harbors — a great port opening 
the way to all of southern Russia, permitting access to the Black 
Sea, and on both sides of it a strategic position which all the na- 
tions of the earth, except America, have coveted and which all 



4 The Annals of the American Academy 

the nations of the earth, even today, except this land of ours, 
would be willing, perhaps, to possess. The disposal of Con- 
stantinople is one problem. 

The Turks in Europe 

Then it has been said that the Turk, because of the atrocities 
which the Turkish government has permitted against the Armeni- 
ans, should be driven from Europe. Now, there are between 
700,000 and 1,000,000 Moslem Turks in that part of Turkey in 
Europe between Constantinople and Adrianople. They have 
lived there for five hundred years — they and their families. It 
might be almost as cruel to deport them from that land and 
from their homes as it was cruel to send out those hundreds of 
thousands of Armenians from their homes where they had 
lived for centuries. 

Side by side with that suggestion comes a proposition to inter- 
nationalize, or place under international control, the whole of the 
Turkish Empire, leaving the land and its peoples as it is. This 
might permit the working out of its salvation by each nation. 

Confederation of Turkey 

The next plan which I have seen proposed is one that meets 
with little favor from any one. It is to make a sort of confedera- 
tion, as it were, of all these countries — to try to make a kind of 
a United States out of Turkey, some states to be free, some to be 
partly free, some to be placed under the guidance or under the 
protectorate of a great foreign power, all to have some measure of 
independence — all, I presume, with the idea of working out as 
time goes by their own independence. For the Moslem Turk 
himself there would be reserved a new country carved out of 
Asiatic Turkey, where the greatest number of the Moslem Turks 
reside. 

Syria and Lebanon 

Syria, according to this plan, would be semi-independent with 
France for her guidance and protection. But those of Syrian 
birth would feel dissatisfied with any guidance or with any 
protectorate, claiming that they themselves are entitled to be an 
independent people. Yet France claims certain ancient and in- 
alienable rights, as she puts it, in Syria. Also the Lebanonites, in- 



Problems of the Ottoman Empire 5 

habiting that ancient country of Lebanon, assert the right of 
independence, and over them, too, France claims certain rights of 
protection and guidance. 

Armenia 

Armenia likewise claims, with reason and justice, that she 
should be given, some say, full independence and freedom. 
Speaking of her history, of her peoples, of her requirements and 
what she has accomplished, Armenians point with real pride to 
what their people have become throughout the world, as an 
example of what they may be able to do if they live under a free 
government of their own. Some say, however, that there should 
be a protectorate over that land, and to America many of the 
Armenians offer this task. 

Arabia 

Arabia presents another problem. The Arabians, when the 
war came, with the assistance of England, proclaimed themselves 
an independent kingdom and set up a power of their own, and 
they, too, claimed the right to have a government of their own. 

I have thus briefly outlined the story of the Ottoman Empire, 
its history, the problems of its future. There are other prob- 
lems^-Palestine, for instance, but all these can be solved 
with intelligence and thought, and solved in such a way as to 
bring to these peoples the realization of their aspirations for 
liberty and freedom and justice. We are today turning over a 
leaf in history which for those peoples of the Near East is momen- 
tous. For them the pages of the past have been written in 
letters of blood. Now we turn for them and for the whole world 
to a much fairer and a brighter page: the one whereon will be 
inscribed the victories of peace and the triumphs of the right — 
the right for which those peoples in that far off land have looked 
so far in vain. We hope and believe, however, that this time 
it shall not be in vain. 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 

By Henry W. Jessup, M.A., J.D. 

New York 

'^"V/TENE, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin. Mene: God hath 
-^ -*- numbered thy kingdom and finished it. Tekel: Thou 
art weighed in the balances and found wanting. Peres: Thy 
kingdom is divided." These words uttered to the reckless Bel- 
shazzar are equally applicable to the Sultan of Turkey. "The 
writing is on the wall. " By successive breaches of trust, by 
cruelties beyond recording, by a congenital incapacity to appre- 
ciate the restraints of civilization, by the very nature of his relig- 
ion, and, I regret to add, by the very record of his experience in 
overreaching the great powers after each relapse into savagery, it 
is no longer a question what shall be done to protect the Turkish 
empire or to safeguard its integrity, but what shall be done to as- 
sure security of life "and an absolutely unmolested opportunity 
of autonomous development to the oppressed nationalities hereto- 
fore under Turkish rule. " And this question relates itself to four 
of such nationalities : the Armenians, the Greeks, the Syrians and 
the Arabs. The separation of the last two is intentional. 

America's Relation to the Turkish Problem 

First, however, what is the relationship of the United States to 
this problem.'* It would be idle to speak of the interest of the 
American people in the sufferings of those upon whom the com- 
bined savagery of Turk and Teuton has been unleashed since 1914. 
Torturings beyond the ingenuity of the inquisition; deportation 
of entire communities into the deserts; indiscriminate slaughter 
and robbery; rapings and ravishings; systematic starvation of 
whole villages by blockade; — all these, thus too mildly summarized, 
aroused and shocked the conscience of America and elicited a de- 
gree of benevolent helpfulness never before paralleled. Hence I 
may safely assert as my premise that the American people demand 
of the government of the United States that never again shall it 
take, in respect to such conditions and such sufferings, the at- 
titude of indifference and trustfulness which the records of our 

6 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 7 

state department show that it took on the occasion of the last 
massacres, to go back no further than 1909. I refer to the mas- 
sacres under "Abdul the Damned" which preceded the so-called 
"Constitution of July, 1908," which Mr. Leishman, and many 
others, thought was a real revolution of reform calculated to bring 
about an era, according to our easy-going minister, "of universal 
good-will and fraternity among all the races and creeds of the 
empire." His reports are recorded in a book entitled. Foreign 
Relations of the United States, which is readily accessible. In 
this same book is recorded the attempt of Congressman Bennett to 
secure some intervention on the part of the United States to put a 
stop to the massacres of the Armenians which were again arousing 
the attention of the civilized world. A petition had been presented 
to the President, and the Department of State made the following 
answer: 

Depabtment of State 
Washington, June 28, 1909. 

Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge your letter of the 18th, enclosing a 
petition from the representatives of the Armenian EvangeUcal Alhance, addressed 
to the President, urging the iafluence of the United States for the amelioration of 
the condition of the Armenians. 

The petition has been read with attention and uiterest. This question has 
from time to time had the earnest consideration of this government for many 
years, and the recent terrible events in Asia Minor have served to further mani- 
fest the deep sympathy of the American people and the abhorrence of the Presi- 
dent over the atrocities perpetrated. While the government of the United 
States, not being a signatory to the Berlin Treaty engagement, deems itself — as 
the petitioners seem not unaware — ^precluded from any consideration on its part 
of a question of intervention in the present circumstances, or of sharing in those 
treaty responsibiHties, the sentiments of this government and its earnest desire 
that the Armenians shall possess absolute seciu-ity of life and property are com- 
mon knowledge to the concert of great powers who by the treaty compact aimed 
to accomplish that result. 

Every thinking American deplores the antagonism, differences, and opposing 
ambitions which have arrayed the racial and religious elements of the Turkish 
population against each other. The sufferings of the innocent victims in the late 
outrages have deeply touched American sympathies. Neither in these events 
nor in times past has this government looked on unmoved. It has always wished 
that it had the power to prevent such sufferings, but it is convinced that, in the 
obvious impossibility of intervention, it is powerless. The broader tendencies 
developing in the Near East and the moral suasion of the Christian treaty powers 
must be trusted finally to prevail to recoiicile the opposing factions. 



8 The Annals of the American Academy 

It is no longer a question of dealing with a government implicated in the Armenian 
massacres. It is earnestly believed that the best course now for the betterment of 
the unfortunate people concerned is to exhibit a degree of confidence in the newly 
established constitutional government, whose Sultan has solemnly proclaimed to 
Parliament his horror over the awful slaughter among his subjects, his firm inten- 
tion to punish the guilty, and his purpose to use his fullest power to maintain 
peace, justice, and tranquillity throughout his dominions and among all races 
and religionists. The magnitude and difficulty of the task of the new regime 
should win the sympathy of all well-wishers of peace and justify a fair opportunity 
of accomplishment without iaterference. 

The hopeful promise of reforms seems to be confirmed by the recent official 
reports from Tvu"key that the constitutional government is taking vigorous meas- 
ures for the complete restoration of order in Asia Minor, for a rigid investigation 
of the massacres, and for the effective military protection of the disturbed dis- 
tricts. All of which, it is hoped, will prevent a recurrence of the recent lament- 
able events, which are deplored as keenly by the President as they can be by any 
citizens. 

A copy of the petition of the Armenian Evangelical Alliance wiU be communi- 
cated to the American ambassador to Tm-key, who is fully aware of the Presi- 
dent's views in the premises. 

I have, etc., 

Huntington Wilson. 

Publicity has been recently given to the trial and execution of 
one or more individuals as an evidence of the good faith of the new 
Sultan, Mohammed VI, who expresses disapprobation of all the 
acts of his predecessor and of the Pasha generals who had control 
of affairs during the war. It is barely possible that these execu- 
tions have actually taken place, but in any event the widest 
publicity is being given to them in the conviction which the Turk 
has long entertained that the Occidental mind will interpret an 
act of this sort as being done for the reasons and pursuant to the 
motives that would dominate an Occidental government in such 
an inquiry and punishment. Nothing of the kind is true of the 
Turkish attitude. They are merely laying their offenses upon 
scapegoats and dismissing them into the wilderness. If necessary 
a hundred or a thousand victims would be offered for the purpose 
of clearing the skirts and saving the suzerainty of the Sultan. The 
American mind, without the actual experience of living under the 
Turkish government and with the subjects of Turkey, cannot 
readily appreciate the attitude of the Mohammedan Turk to his 
non-Moslem subjects. Justice to the Christian populations of 
Turkey impartially administered is absolutely incompatible with 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire d 

the Mohammedan religion or with the Ottoman Turk's theory of 
government, and the sooner that is reaHzed the better. In 
Mohammedan law there is only one word expressing the relation 
of the Moslem to the non-Moslem, and that is Jehad, i.e.. Holy 
War. 

In a report on the capitulations of the Ottoman empire, pub- 
lished in 1881 by our state department,^ Edward A. Van Dyck 
calls attention to the fact that of all consuls residing in the various 
Moslem countries along the shores of the Mediterranean those that 
are sent by the government of the United States are, perhaps, more 
deficient than any others in an acquaintance with the growth and 
history of the peculiar and exceptional relations that have long 
existed between the Christian nations of Europe and the Moham- 
medan nations of North Africa and Western Asia. The writer 
observes : 

It accordingly happens quite often that a newly appointed consul arrives at his 
post in a Tvirkish city without a knowledge of the principles that govern the rela- 
tions of his fellow-citizens residiug in the consular district to which he has been 
sent with the authorities and natives of the land, between whom he is the only 

proper medium of official communication He knows not the native 

language and he has scarcely any, or iu most cases, no acquaintance at all with 
the commercial and diplomatic languages of the Levant, which are the French 
and Italian. 

With one or two notable exceptions, this same criticism might 
apply to the ministers of the United States at Constantinople. 
They have been almost uniformly ignorant of the fundamental 
characteristics of Turkish character and of Oriental customs and 
habits of thought and expression. Themselves direct and truth- 
speaking, they have been easily overreached by exaggerated 
courtesy and hyperbole of speech. 

The Arabs have a tradition that when the devil set forth to 
distribute lies over the earth, he lay down with his seven bagfuls 
on a mountain to take a nap. An inquisitive Syrian got six bags 
opened, and liberated their contents, before Shaitan awoke. 
Hence the superfluity of falsehood in the Near East. 

Kent in his Law of Nations observes that, "international 

1 Largely based on the English translation of the introduction to Dr. Rattes- 
chi's Mamial on Ottoman Public and Private Law, and on DeTesta's Collection 
of Treaties with Turkey, on Brunswick's work on the Reforms and Capitulations 
of Turkey, and on Arabic and other soxirces. 



10 The Annals of the American AcADEMf 

law, as professed by the civilized nations of Christendom, is the 
offspring of the communion of ideas subsisting between them, and 
is based upon a common origin, and an almost identical faith." 
In the light of this statement. Van Dyck states that the intercourse 
between the Christian world and the Mohammedan world is not 
founded upon the principles of the law of nations and that the 
relations of the one to the other for years had to be regulated solely 
with a view to political expediency and in accordance with treaties 
entered into between them. Anyone familiar with the Moham- 
medan religion and with the science of Moslem jurisprudence 
knows that there is, as above noted, only one relationship between 
those who recognize the apostleship of Mohammed and those who 
do not, i.e.. Jehad. Someone has recorded of Brian Boru, the 
first king of Ireland, that he was a mythical character who never 
existed, and was succeeded by his son. It may be similarly stated 
that the fictitious will or command of Mohammed called in some 
ancient records, "The Treaty of Mohammed with the Christians," 
and often referred to as proof of Mohammedan justness and 
equity, is equally mythical. It never existed, and the successors of 
Mohammed have entertained the same sentiments as Mohammed 
did with regard to non-Moslems. The purpose of Islam is the 
propagation of faith in one God and in Mohammed as his prophet 
And the mode of such propagation is by a holy, perpetual war 
against unbelievers, in order to convert them, or subject them to 
the payment of tribute. This right to wage war is the only 
principle of international law taught by Mohammedan jurists. 
Moreover, the "justice of the Cadi," and the equity of the 
Caliphs is evidence of the Arab nature and characteristics, not of 
those of the Ottoman Turks. 

Singularly enough, the early European jurists took an identical 
position, recognizing no international law as against Moslems and 
holding that there ought always to be war with them. But about 
the middle of the nineteenth century the Sublime Porte under the 
stress of international events, recognized and itself exercised the 
right of legation and entered into many international obligations, 
capitulations or treaties. Since the Treaty of Paris in 1856, it has 
had a place in the political concert of Europe. This is not to say 
that there were not capitulations or treaties between Moslem 
rulers before the Turks, and between the Turks themselves, relat- 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 11 

ing to certain commercial rights and the rights of citizens of va- 
rious powers within the domains of the Sultan of Egypt or of 
Turkey. But it is a sufficient introduction to the statement that 
the United States of America, even since the Treaty of 1862 with 
Turkey, which was abrogated in 1882, has held an attitude of 
aloofness, with regard to affairs in Turkey and the treatment 
by Turkey of its non-Moslem subjects. An attitude, which, 
however consistent with the Monroe Doctrine, is at times incon- 
sistent with those high principles which the government of the 
United States has from time to time asserted by force of arms; 
notably in the case of the Spanish War and the Philippines. Once 
in awhile the cruelty of the Turks, always ready to manifest itself, 
has found an opportunity. Such opportunities have arisen when 
the great military powers, of which alone it was afraid, were so 
engaged, that, before anything could be done by way of preven- 
tion, the Turks have by massacre attempted to cut the Gordian 
knot of their total inability to administer justice for and among 
their non-Moslem subjects. 

I append extracts from the constitution of the Ottoman empire 
as revised in 1909 after the revolution of July, 1908, which consti- 
tution gave to our state department, as well as to the subjects of 
the Turkish empire, great hopes of a real reform. Note the fol- 
lowing articles in particular: 

4. That the Sultan is, in his character of Supreme Caliph, the protector of the 
Mohammedan religion. 

5. His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, is irresponsible; his person is sacred. 

10. The liberty of the individual is absolutely inviolable. No one can under 
any pretext be arrested or made to suffer any penalty except according to the 
forms and in the cases prescribed by the religious and civil laws! 

11. Islamism is the religion of the state. 

26. Torture and examination by tortm-e in all forms are entirely and absolutely 
forbidden! 

And then note, after the provisions protecting civil rights, es- 
tablishing judicial machinery, etc.. Article 113: 

In case of a state of affairs or indications of such a nature as to render distur- 
bances probable at some point in the territory of the empire, the imperial govern- 
ment has the right to proclaim a state of siege. 

The effect of a state of siege is the temporary suspension of the civil laws. 

So that we may say that all that has been done by Turkish 
soldiery acting under military orders in respect to the subject 



12 The Annals of the American Academy 

Christian peoples of Turkey since the war began has been done 
under the constitution. 

America's Relation to Turkey During the War 

But before discussing the direct subject of this paper, it is 
proper to inquire whether the United States is under any particular 
obligation, moral or otherwise, to take an active part internation- 
ally in enforcing a settlement of this Turkish question. I contend 
that it is ; and this by reason of the following facts : 

When Turkey entered the Great War as an ally of Germany she 
declared war on France and England. Thereupon the United 
States government, through its consular and diplomatic agents, 
was intrusted with the protection of the interests of the French 
and English nationals in Turkey. With few if any exceptions 
these nationals in Syria were missionaries, or missionary teachers, 
representing English and French missionary activities which had 
been established for several generations in Syria. Many of these 
missionaries were aged men and women, gentlefolk, refined, loved 
by the people. Suffice it to say that they were non-combatants 
and entitled to reasonable opportunity to leave the country. 
They were promptly arrested by the Turkish governor of the 
province, who was a member of the Turkish war cabinet and a 
general in the Turkish army. These people appealed at once to 
the American consul, who sent back word by the messenger (who 
was, of course, one of the governor's soldiery) that he "could do 
nothing. " One of the English missionaries sent back a protest 
saying that if the situation were reversed and an American in like 
case appealed to the English consul, "the English consul would 
secure his release in fifteen minutes." To this the American 
consul sent back the reply that his "instructions were explicit, 
not to embroil the United States. " 

It seems inconceivable that our state department could have 
intended to "welch" on its international obligation of trust to 
protect the rights of these nationals by any general or explicit 
instructions. Nevertheless, as the matter developed, the United 
States was not embroiled ! These French and English missionaries 
were interned in dirty dungeons, their rights ignored, and that 
stage of the incident was closed. 

But, the Turkish government was in possession of the informa- 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 13 

tion that the instructions of the American consuls were that they 
must not embroil the United States. Whereupon step number 
two was taken. When the American consul had assumed the 
responsibility of protecting French and English interests he had 
proceeded to the French and English consulates and sealed the 
archives and the offices with the United States seal. The 
Turkish governor-general repaired to the French consulate, broke 
the United States seal and claimed to have discovered, as was 
afterwards recorded in his proclamation, published in the Cairo 
newspapers, documents implicating the loyalty of members of the 
Syrian reform committee, who had for years been endeavoring to 
secure reforms in taxation and the administration of justice in the 
province of Syria. On the strength of these alleged proofs of 
disloyalty he arrested and executed a number of the members of 
this committee. One member of the committee who was not 
arrested and escaped has told me these facts in my own office. 

I have been unable by careful inquiry to ascertain that the 
United States ever secured any satisfaction for this outrageous 
insult to its dignity, although I gave the fact the utmost publicity 
at the time that I learned of it. My information is that nothing 
was done by the United States at the time. The incident in its 
second stage was thus closed. 

This brings us to the early part of 1915. The United States, 
in 1909, had, as above stated, expressed itself as precluded from 
any consideration of a question of intervention, in the matter of 
the atrocities perpetrated in Asia Minor, because it was not a 
signatory of the treaty of Berlin. This was a public document 
and, of course, thoroughly well known to the Sublime Porte. 
France and England were the only powers fear of whom would 
have deterred the Turks from what they were about to do. 
Germany was its ally, and, if we are to believe the testimony even 
of Germans, was in part an instigator of the events that followed. 
But, for the purposes of this paper, I wish to emphasize the fact 
that it was not until after the United States had been felt out, and 
it had been discovered that the representatives of the United 
States had explicit instructions "not to embroil the United States," 
and after the United States had made no sign, although the United 
States seal had been placed by its consul upon the French consulate, 
and had been violated by the Turkish governor-general, and noth- 



14 The Annals of the American Academy 

ing had been done, that the massacres commenced in the spring of 
1915. They did commence. They were continued. News of 
them leaked out, and in the long cruel years since that time persons 
in the United States have been contributing to the relief of the 
victims of Turkish savagery, trying to keep body and soul to- 
gether of the wretched survivors of the families raped, robbed, 
deported and massacred by the brutal Turkish soldiery under direct 
orders from Constantinople. Yet the United States, so far as its 
official activities have been concerned, did not declare war on 
Turkey ! We finally declared war upon Turkey's ally, Germany, 
but we limited our diplomatic representations as to these mas- 
sacres to a request through Germany that Berlin would exercise 
its kindly and humane offices to persuade the Sultan to put an end 
to these atrocities. A request that must have aroused that sense 
of humor which the Oriental possesses in such marked degree. 
Talaat and Enver have been known to smile.* Keen and intuitive 
as is the Oriental mind, it was difficult for the Turk to understand 
how he could be an ally of Germany and we could be at war with 
Germany and yet not at war with him. The argument post hoc 
propterea hoc may not apply, but it suggests itself. The United 
States when it entered the war did so with assurances to the world 
that gave to our entry into the war the character of a crusade in 
support of freedom, liberation of oppressed peoples and the de- 
termination to crush those powers of savagery that seemed to 
threaten the world. But so far as Turkey was concerned we 
refused to strike a blow to free her cruelly oppressed subjects — 
nor was our flag seen in the operations that laid those people under 
eternal obligations to their liberators. 

These facts, however, I believe lay us under the compulsion of a 
moral obligation at the present juncture. 

America's Post- War Relation to Turkey 

But now that the war is over and the covenants of the League 
of Nations are being welded the situation has changed. 

Consider first the attitude of the several nations interested in 
the solution of the problem before us. The attitude of isola- 

*Note: Our state department even sent a cable message felicitating the 
Sultan on his august birthday! Even the melancholy monarch must then 
have smiled. 



The ]B*uttJre oi^ i*he Ottoman Empire 1^ 

tion of the United States may be assumed to have been changed 
forever. 

In the 12th of Mr. Wilson's fourteen points uttered January 8, 
1918, he demanded: 

The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman empire should be assured a secure 
sovereignty but the other nationaUties which are now under Turkish rvde should 
be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity 
of autonomous development. 

In his rejoinder, of February 11, 1918, to the Central Powers, 
i.e., formulating his "four principles, " he denied the right to barter 
provinces from sovereignty to sovereignty, and demanded that 
every territorial settlement must be made "in the interest and for 
the benefit of the populations concerned," but added as the fourth 
principle that, "all well-defined national aspirations shall be ac- 
corded the utmost satisfaction that can be accorded them without 
introducing new or perpetuating old elements of discord and antago- 
nism. " 

In his Mount Vernon address July 4, 1918, he propounded as 
one of the "four ends" being fought for and which must be con- 
ceded before there could be peace : 

The settlement of every question whether of territory, of sovereignty, of 
economic arrangement or of political relationship, upon the basis of the free ac- 
ceptance of that settlement by the people immediately concerned. 

There can be no argument on the proposition that Armenia and 
Syria can claim rightfully that as nationalities under Turkish 
rule, whose interests are vitally concerned by any territorial settle- 
ment of the Turkish situation, they must be protected by the 
fourteen points, the four principles and the four great ends. 

As to the attitude of Russia in relation to Armenia, the memoran- 
dum presented by the delegates of the Armenian Republic to the 
Peace Conference on February 26, 1919, pointed out that after the 
breakdown of the Russian-Caucasian army and the withdrawal of 
their support of the Armenians, who had so loyally cooperated in 
the war up to that point, the Russians by the infamous treaty of 
Brest-Litovsk completely deserted their Armenian allies. This 
treaty left to the Turks the provinces of Turkish Armenia, which 
had been conquered by the Russian and Armenian armies, and also 
turned over to thfe Turks the purely Armenian provinces of the 
Caucasus, of Kars and Kaghisman, of Batum and Ardahan. 



16 The Annals of the American Academy 

The Bolshevik government gave pubKcity to a so-called "Secret 
Treaty" that had been made by Great Britain, France and Russia, 
by which Turkish Armenia was to be partitioned between France 
and Russia. France was given Syria, and England was to receive 
Mesopotamia and the Palestinian ports of Acre and Haifa. 
Whether the President of the United States had knowledge of this 
treaty when he made his pledges to the oppressed nationalities in 
Turkey at the time we entered the great crusade now proves to be 
immaterial. I do not believe he had such knowledge. The 
Arabs, who revolted, and were achieving their plan of a free 
Arabia and Syria, certainly did not — Prince Faisul so states. But, 
as I say, it is now immaterial, for, in documents — presented by the 
Rev. Dr. Bliss, the president of the Protestant College of Beirut, 
when he was invited to appear before the Peace Conference on be- 
half of the people of Syria, who petitioned to be consulted as to 
their political future before any government were imposed upon 
them by the Peace Conference — it appears that in 1918 a declara- 
tion had been agreed to between the British and French govern- 
ments and communicated to the President of the United States of 
America. This was published in the Palestine News of November, 
1918, and the following is an extract therefrom: 

The aim which France and Great Britain have in view ia waging in the East the 
war let loose on the world by German ambition, is to ensure the complete and 
final emancipation of all those peoples so long oppressed by the Tiu"ks, and to 
establish national governments and administrations which shall derive their 
authority from the initiative and free will of the people themselves. 

To realize this, France and Great Britain are in agreement to encourage and 
assist the establishment of native governments in Syria and Mesopotamia, now 
liberated by the AlUes, as also in those territories for whose liberation they are 
striving and to recognize those governments immediately they are effectively 
established. 

Far from wishing to impose on the peoples of these regions this or that institu- 
tion, they have no other care than to ensure, by their support and practical aid, 
the normal workings of such governments and administrations as the peoples shall 
themselves have adopted; to guarantee impartial and even justice for all, to 
facilitate the economic development of the country by arousing and encom-aging 
local initiative, to foster the spread of education, to put an end to those factions 
too long exploited by Turkish policy — such is the part which the two allied govern- 
ments have set themselves to play in liberated territories. 

In addition to this I quote the nineteenth section of the League 
of Nations Covenant, as presented to the Peace Conference 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 17 

February 14, 1919, so far as I am able to quote it in its last-known 
form: 

Certain communities formerly belonging to the Turkish empire have reached 
a stage of development where their existence as independent nations can be 
provisionally recognized, subject to the rendering of administrative advice and 
assistance by a mandatory power until such time as they are able to stand alone. 
The wishes of these communities must be a principal consideration in the selec- 
tion of the mandatory power. 

I learn that a commission has accordingly been despatched from 
the Peace Conference to elicit such wishes on the ground. 

The Four Nationalities 

We have mentioned four groups or distinct nationalities to be 
protected in any international arrangement for the future of the 
Ottoman empire. If the claims of these four groups are recognized 
to any substantial extent the direct result will be to restrict the 
Sultan of Turkey to the territorial boundaries of the so-called 
province of Anatolia; to internationalize Constantinople, the 
Dardanelles, and the Bagdad railway; and to leave the Sultan 
shorn of his suzerainty of the Greeks of Asia Minor to the west, 
the Armenian republic to the east, the province of Syria to the 
south, and to the south of that the kingdom of Arabia. 

The Arab Claims 

Each of the groups above mentioned makes its peculiar claim to 
recognition. The Arabs revolting against the Turks, have oc- 
cupied the entire Arabian peninsula, have organized a government 
under the King of Hedjaz, have seized the holy cities of Mecca and 
Medina, and rendered substantial service to the Allies by furnish- 
ing troops that were used by General Allenby in his expeditionary 
force for the occupation of Palestine and Syria. The recognition 
of their rights presents an interesting feature with regard to the 
future of Mohammedanism. The original Caliphs were Arabs. 
The language of Islam is the Arabic. Mecca and Medina are 
Arab cities and holy cities of the religion. With the conquests of 
the Ottoman Turk the Osmanli assumed rights of leadership and 
control in the Moslem world against which there has always been 
strong protest. The Sheikh-ul-Islam has been located at the 
capital of the Ottoman empire and has interchangeably been 



18 The Annals of the American Academ"? 

dominated by or has dominated the politics of the empire. To 
de-nationaHze Constantinople might conceivably result in the 
Sheikh-ul-Islam repairing to the Holy City of Mecca and in 
restoring the purity of the original Islamic rule. Or the King of 
Hedjaz, who was himself Shereef of Mecca, or even his pictur- 
esque son, Prince Faisul, under the influence of the romantic ideals 
of Lawrence, his Fidus Achates, might assume the Caliphate. 

The Arab hatred and distrust of thciTurkish claims could not 
have been lessened by the brutal threat of the Turkish garrison of 
Medina, when they were attacked, to blow up Mohammed's 
Tomb! The Arab Moslems may again come into their own. 
They would include the wandering pastoral Bedawins who are 
simple monotheists and, though regarded by the government as 
Mohammedans, have no religious sheikhs or imams, no places of 
worship, no hours of prayer, rarely keep the Fast of Ramadan, 
or make the pilgrimage to Mecca. So the Moslems say: "There 
are three classes who have no religion, muleteers, Bedawin Arabs, 
and women." — {Kamil, H. H. Jessup.) 

The character of the pure Arab, on the other hand, has been 
unchanged through the centuries. His dignity, his cult of hos- 
pitality, his pride of race, his ambition, his independence, his 
virility, all give promise of the emergence of a nation apt for 
self-government and capable of centralizing within itself the hopes 
and aspirations of the Moslem world with all that that implies. 

Conflicting Claims of Syria 

The adjustment of the boundary between the kingdom of the 
Arabs and the province of Syria, supposing the latter to extend 
from the angle formed by the Asia Minor coast with the easterly 
coast of the Mediterranean, from Antioch and Aleppo down to the 
Egyptian frontier, would be a matter not unattended with dif- 
ficulties. Damascus is, in a sense, one of the Holy Cities of Islam, 
but it is also the historic capital of Syria. Yet Prince Faisul de- 
sires to have his boundaries extend to include the region around 
Damascus. On the other hand, the province of Syria, if it is to 
be self-supporting, must control the hinterland including Aleppo 
and Damascus. It should include the whole coast from Alexan- 
dretta down to Egypt, and should go right back to the desert and 
include the Damascus plains. The plains of the Bukaa or Coele- 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 19 

Syria, between the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon ranges are the 
most fertile part of Syria. Nothing would be gained by continuing 
the separation of Lebanon from the coast cities. ^ As a matter of 
Note. — The following letter expands this suggestion of incompatibility: 

2 To the Editor of The New York Times: 

Thus far the objections raised against the claim of the King Hedjaz to rule 
Syria and Mesopotamia have been that the Syrians and Mesopotamians are not 
of Arab race; that historically they possessed, and stUl possess, a much higher 
stage of civihzation, and that socially and intellectually they are way ahead. 
The logical inference is, therefore, that they cannot hope to reap many economic 
and educational benefits if their countries join Arabia. 

But there is another and more cogent reason why such a poHtical union is 
inadvisable, and that is rehgion. Religion, we should bear in mind, is the con- 
trolling factor in the aflFairs of that part of the Near East of which I am writing. 
When, a few years ago, D. Saaty of Providence, R. I., took to Mosul an ice-making 
machine, he was told by the authorities there that the ice making was the work 
of the Creator and that, therefore, it was against the will of Allah to grant him a 
permit. The difference between the inhabitants of the Tigris-Euphrates Valley 
and those of the Arabian peninsula, as far as enlightenment goes, is like that 
which exists between the Americans and the Mexicans. 

What the various parts of Turkey need, and need very badly, is the establish- 
ment of a just and tolerant government. But no native race at present can 
administer such a government, whether Arabs, Syrians, Assyrians, Armenians, 
Turks, or Kurds. For they all lack the sense of political justice and the spirit 
of religious tolerance as are embodied in the principles of our western institutions. 
How could they be otherwise when they have been for many centuries living in 
the environments created by the crooked and oppressive Turk.'* There is no 
feeling of race unity among them; religion is their sole guiding principle. But 
the conflicting beliefs have kept them apart and tend to prevent their union as a 
single nation. The most deplorable fact is that there are no native influences to 
coxmteract these divergent tendencies. Hence comes the lu'gent need for foreign 
mandatories. 

We may admit, I think, that the Arabs are as just in their dealings as any na- 
tionality of their neighbors. But it must be conceded also that the people of 
Al-Hedjaz are the most intolerant. This is attested by the undeniable fact that 
no person not belonging to their creed can enter Makkah, where the King of 
Arabia resides, and come out alive if he is caught. Now, how the Makkans will 
be able to make good in Syria and Mesopotamia, where live so many Christians,, 
Jews, Druses, Devil Worshippers, and what not, is very hard to understand. 
It is still harder to comprehend how enlightened European statesmen, who were 
a while ago making so much noise about the rights of small nationalities, allow 
themselves to be persuaded that narrow-minded nomads can advantageously 
govern civilized commxmities. 

The natives of Mesopotamia desire the establishment of an independent state 
along modern Unes, under the trusteeship of Great Britain, to be administered 



20 The Annals of the American Academy 

fact, taking the population of the cities on the coast, and of 
Damascus together with the population of the Lebanon villages, 
the Druse, the Maronites,^ the Nusairiyeh, diverse as they are, 
hostile to one another as they are, yet, there are influences that 
would set the province on its feet in less than twenty years. 
These are the influences that have been at work through Christian 
missions for three generations, the tutelage of a disinterested, im- 
partial mandatary, the intelligence of the people, and the long- 
developing desire for independence together with a just system of 
taxation and an opportunity to develop the resources of the 
country and a wise system of re-forestation. One of the interest- 
ing landmarks on the Eastern slope of the Lebanon is a stone with 
the inscription: 

DELIM 1 i.e. 



HADR 
IMP. 



SYLV Hadrian's 



Forest 
Preserve. 



Under the Turks there has been no "forest preserve" and even 
the Cedars of Lebanon have been decimated. The commissioners 
who have been sent by the Peace Conference to Syria to ascertain 

for all of its inhabitants without distinction as to race or creed. I say Great 
Britain because of the peculiar interest of England in that part of the Orient, 
and because of her immense sacrifices in bringing deliverance to all Mesopotamia, 
including the province of Diarbekir, which lately has been occupied by British 
troops, but above all because we have a great confidence in the British sense of 
justice and in the British virtue of religious tolerance which she has so brilUantly 
demonstrated in India and Egypt. For this reason we are respectfully petitioning 
the Peace Conference not to entangle our fair land of the Two Rivers with the 
dreary land of the desert. 

IsYA Joseph. 
Port Chester, N. Y., Feb. 10, 1919. 

^Maronites: "A papal sect, the ancient Monothelites, who accepted the 
papacy 1182 A. D., during the Crusades. They get their name from John Maron, 
monk, priest and patriarch, who died 707 A. D. They adhere to the Oriental 
rite, conducting service in the Syriac, a language not understood by the people. 
The only sin unpardonable by the priests is reading the Bible. The people are 
chiefly peasants, in Northern Lebanon, an illiterate people, and an educated 
priesthood, sworn to allegiance to Rome and yet having a married parish clergy. 
Their head is the Patriarch of Antioch, living in Lebanon, and regarded by the 
people as hardly inferior to the Pope," — {Fifty-three Years in Syria, H. H. 
Jessup.) 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 21 

the desire of the people by some form of referendum with regard 
to the power which they would ask to have exercise the mandate of 
the League of Nations, will ascertain the ratio now subsisting be- 
tween the Moslems and the so-called Christians of this province. 
In the Lebanon the Christians are in a majority, unless the sys- 
tematic starvation practiced by the Turks has decimated them. 
This includes the Maronites, Greek Catholics and Protestants, 
but in the cities other than Damascus the Moslems probably 
would be in the majority. I do not here take into account the 
Druzes* of the Lebanon nor the Nusairiyeh^ in the mountains 

*Druzes: The Druzes are neither Moslem nor Christian, but a peculiar, 
secret, mystic sect, having no priesthood and no assemblies for worship, claiming 
to be Unitarians, or believers in one God, infinite, indefinable, incomprehensible 
and passionless, who has become incarnate in a succession of ten men, the last of 
whom was the mad Egyptian caliph. Hakim b'amr lUah, who was assassinated 
A. D. 1044. They are more of a political than a rehgious society, and the national 
spirit is intense. The Druse nation can neither increase nor decrease. It is 
lawful to pretend to believe in the religion of any sect among whom they dwell. 
Among the Moslems they are Moslems, among the Jews, Jews, among the Greeks 
they are Greeks, among the Romanists they are good papists, and among the 
Protestants they are Evangelical BibUcal Christians. In politics they look to the 
English for protection, and have always favored the American schools. They 
are courteous, hospitable, industrious, temperate and brave. The okkal, or 
initiated class, use neither tobacco nor liquors of any kind. Any one leaving 
their sect for Christianity would be disinherited." — {Fifty-three Years in Syria, 
H. H. Jessup.) 

In the year 1872 they suflfered a serious disappointment. It was the year 
predicted as the final crisis or cataclysm of their religion. Their prophet El- 
hakem, who claimed to be an incarnation of the Deity, promised when he died, 
1021 A. D., to retiu-n with an immense army from China, overthrow Islam and 
subject the earth to his sway. 

* Nusairiyeh: They hold to the transmigration of souls, that the souls of all 
men at death pass into new bodies, and that unbelievers are at death transformed 
into some one of the lower animals. They believe that the spirits of Moslem 
sheikhs at death take the bodily form of asses; that Christian doctors enter swine 
bodies; that Jewish rabbis take the form of male apes; that wicked Nusairis 
enter into domestic animals; great sceptics among them into apes, while persons 
of mixed character enter bodies of men of other sects. They simulate all sects, 
as do the Druzes, and on meetuig Moslems swear to them that they likewise fast 
and pray. But on entering a mosque they mutter curses against Abu Bekr, Omar 
and Othman and others. They say, "We are the body, all other sects are 
clothing; but whatever clothing a man may put on, it does not injure him, and 
one who does not simulate is a fool, for no reasonable man will go naked in the 
market-place." So they are Christians with the Christians, Jews with the Jews, 
and all things, literally, to all men. 



22 The Annals of the American Academy 

north of Tripoli. It has been reported that during the war by the 
systematic starvation of village after village in the Lebanon the 
number of the Christian population has been diminished, some 
estimates reaching as high as 100,000. Whether this be true or 
not there would be no expectation of a constitutional government 
in which the Christians of Syria could have the majority. 

It will be noted that this discussion of the province of Syria 
makes no account of the so-called Zionist state, to include Jerusa- 
lem and perhaps the province of Judea. To the writer this plan 
presents no features entitling it to consideration. Politically it is 
an iridescent dream. That there should be, under a constitutional 
government to be erected under the tutelage of a mandatory of the 
League of Nations, absolute freedom of immigration to the Jews is 
unquestionable, but the movement, judging from the past, is not a 
national movement on the part of the Jews. Many of their leaders 
are lukewarm in their advocacy; many of them are frankly op- 
posed to it, and, so far as a Jewish population in Syria is concerned, 
it might be said as a broad generalization, that the Yahudi or Jew 
as a member of the community is anathema alike to the Arab and 
to the Turk. Under international protection and as a place of 
refuge for the pauper Jews of Russia and southeastern Europe, the 
scheme of Baron Hirsch, philanthropic as it was, has not even yet 
resulted in creating an adequate nucleus for a national life. I am 
aware that this Zionist propaganda has ardent supporters in Eng- 

They have secret signs, questions and answers by which they recognize each 
other. For example, one says on meeting a stranger, "Four, two fours, three and 
two, and as many more twice over in thy reUgion, what place have they?" An- 
swer: "In the Journeying Chapter," etc. They use signs, and they use the 
interlacing triangle. In their secret worship they partake of bread and wine. 
They have borrowed from the Bible, the Koran, and from Persian and Sabian 
mysticism. They teach that out of man's sins God created Satans and devils, 
and out of the sins of those devils He made women, and hence no woman is 
taught their religion. When the initiated meet for prayer to Ali, guards are 
placed to keep the women at a distance. Their most binding oath is to swear by 
the faith of the covenant of Ah, prince of believers, and by the covenant of " Ain 
Mim Sin. " Soleman bribed one of the chiefs of the "Northerner " Sect of Nusai- 
ris to tell him the "hidden mystery," which proved to be that the heavens are the 
impersonation of Ali Ibn Abu Talib; the wine-colored river in heaven is Moham- 
med; and the milk-white river is Salman al Farsi; that when we are purified from 
earthly grossness, om- spirits will be elevated to become stars in the Milky Way, 
etc. 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire ^S 

land and in this country, but, so far as I have any opinion in the 
premises, it is adverse to the erection of a separate state interrupt- 
ing the continuity of the province of Syria to the Egyptian frontier, 
and is not based upon any of the fundamental ideas of opportunity 
for autonomous development to a race or nationality outlined 
above. It does not represent a national purpose so much as a 
racial sentiment. The Jews in the United States as a class covet 
the name of Americans and deprecate hyphenation. But in any 
event, should there be recognized such a community or state, it 
should not be allowed to extend its boundaries beyond the old 
province of Judea, except perhaps that it might have access to 
the sea, say at Jaffa. 

Armenia 

The situation of Armenia seems to have been more perfectly 
crystallized than that of any other one of these groups. The so- 
called "Secret Treaty" made in 1915-1916 during the war, be- 
tween France and England, relating to the responsibilities of each 
in respect to Syria, Armenia, Mesopotamia, and other parts of the 
Ottoman empire, was in the nature of counting chickens before 
they were hatched. In another connection I have asked whether 
President Wilson, when he enunciated his fourteen points and four 
principles and four great ends, was or was not in ignorance of the 
provisions of this treaty. If he had knowledge of them then he 
would not have uttered these great pledges to the provinces of the 
Ottoman empire without knowing he would have the approval and 
cooperation of France and England in fulfilling them. If he 
did not know of them, the provisions of this treaty may be 
deemed to be waived, by the joint declaration above quoted, no 
less than if the powers that made it enter into the peace treaty and 
the concomitant covenants of the League of Nations. For to 
whatever power that league shall issue its mandate in respect to 
Armenia, it could only be France, England or the United States, 
to which such mandate would issue. Their consent to the peace 
treaty and the covenant of the league would amount to the abdica- 
tion of any special privilege or right which either may believe her- 
self to have achieved by virtue of these stipulations plus their 
joint victory over the Turk. Armenia comes to the convention 
requesting recognition of her independence. She has history and 



£4 The Annals of the American Academy 

geography to aid in her claims to definite national boundaries. 
But her neighbors-to-be constitute the reason of her willingness to 
be under a temporary tutelage. The Turk will be on her western 
border. The province of Syria on the south will give her little 
concern. Persia on the east is and will be too weak to trouble the 
new nation unless incited or helped by the Great Bear on the north, 
whose claws of aggression may be assumed to be clipped if the 
Dardanelles be "opened as a free passage to the ships and com- 
merce of all nations." 

To what should this tutelage extend, and what is the Armenian 
purpose in desiring it? The answer is reasonably obvious. The 
new nation contemplates: 

1. A constitution guaranteeing to all its inhabitants the institu- 
tions of free government, including a representative congress. 

2. A judicial system under which the rights so guaranteed can 
be protected, and life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness be 
reahzed. 

3. A fiscal system, internal and external (for it will have littorals 
on the Black Sea and on the Mediterranean) including the admin- 
istration of a preliminary national loan, a just tax law and a plan for 
development of the great mineral and other natural resources 
without sacrificing their ultimate control by the people of Armenia 
when and as developed. 

4. A military and police system adequate to the purpose of self- 
defense and self-control. 

But such plans must not be rushed or hurried. For, assuming 
the recognition of the new Armenia by the powers forming the 
League of Nations and the posting of "No Trespassing" notices on 
the Turkish and Russian frontiers, time is indispensable in which 
expatriated Armenians may return, give in their allegiance, and 
participate in the deliberations and elections requisite to launch 
the jiew government. 

As to the constitution and the system of judicial administration 
no doubt much preliminary work has been done. 

As to the details of a fiscal or military system, outside aid or 
advice is imperative. A national loan to be expended wisely and 
without extravagance, would doubtless be subject to a condition 
as to supervision of its expenditure for a period within which the 
new nation could reasonably be expected to get on a firm footing of 



, The Future of the Ottoman Empire 25 

development of its own resources. Without such a loan there 
would be the temptation to raise money by improvident exploita- 
tion of their rich mineral and other resources through concessions, 
as a result of which the bulk of these great assets might fall under 
foreign control. 

Greece in Asia Minor 

With the demands of the fourth group, the Greeks in Asia 
Minor, the following situation presents itself. From classic days 
they have been indigenous to the soil. Crossing the Aegean as 
colonists they settled in another jurisdiction and took the chances 
of such settlement. But at the same time they have created the 
agriculture and commerce of western Asia Minor. Numerically, 
they are in certain districts in an overwhelming majority, and, so 
far as oppression goes, they come within the purview of protection 
of the President's promise on entering the Great War. They 
figure their losses by the massacres as but little less than do the 
Armenians. To those of us who favor the constricting of the 
boundaries of any Turkish rule to the narrowest possible limits, the 
idea of extending the power and sovereignty of Greece over the 
western shores of Asia Minor, and for a considerable distance back 
into the hinterland, commends itself as in the interest of justice 
and of civilization. The limits of Greece are too narrow to contain 
her population. And it is true in a large sense that the govern- 
ment of Greece under its present Prime Minister would give 
promise of restoration of order and of the establishment of a just 
government in western Asia Minor. Moreover, the relation of the 
Grfeek Church to the civil and political life in Greece is such as to 
afford a guaranty of the continuance of such just government if the 
Grecian sovereignty were so extended. The Greeks are naturally 
maritime traders — the Turk is a naval joke.^ 

The Residuary Legatee 

As to the future of the Ottoman Turk — shorn of his territory, 
disgraced in the judgment of the civilized world, confined between 
boundaries having a stronger Greece on the west and an industri- 

6 Note: This prefiguration of the matter has been since justified by the 
landing of two divisions of the Greek Army at Smyrna, under protection of 
Allied warships, — Ed. 



26 The Annals of the American Academy, 

ous and flourishing Armenian state on the east under the tutelage 
and guardianship of one of the great powers of the world — his fate 
calls for no sympathy. It is astonishing that from British sources 
there is a constant reemergence of the sentimental appeal to 
preserve the integrity of the Ottoman empire! That such a sen- 
timent should effectually sway the judgment of the great 
powers seems inconceivable. 

The Bagdad Railway 

Leon Dominian in a review in The Geographical Review for 
January, 1919, of Morris Jastrow's book on The War and the 
Bagdad Railway points out that the whole history of Asiatic 
Turkey is a record of traffic and transportation. It is this fact that, 
so far as Egypt was concerned in its relation to the Babylonian 
dynasties in the past, and so far as the whole world is concerned 
today in questions affecting the Near and Far East, makes the 
question of control of the caravan trade avenues overland to the 
Far East always a question of intimate international concern. 
The caravan routes from Egypt up through Palestine to Hamath 
are now replaced with railroads connecting the new Bagdad rail- 
road, making available, not only for the support of the new 
Armenia but for the world, its rich agricultural resources, its 
manufactures of silk and woolen rugs, and also its resources of 
iron, silver, coal, zinc, manganese and copper, practically com- 
bining all the previous problems of transportation in the problem : 
what is to be the future of the Bagdad railway .f* Except for 
outside foreign influence in localities and the existence of the 
so-called "caravan routes, " there is no adequate system of roads in 
Armenia or Syria or Arabia. Dominian points out, as it had 
been previously developed by Ratzel, 

That periods of prosperity in Asiatic Turkey corresponded to periods when 
roads were adequately policed and travel was safe. That there was such a condi- 
tion existing from a time some six centuries before Christ and lasting through 
Byzantine times, but that the coming of the Turks brought desolation and 
stopped human circulation. Poverty grew as travel diminished. 

It is obvious that the railroad as now projected and built (the 
exact facts not yet being fully known as to the continuity of the 
line through to Bagdad to meet the military lines built by the 
Pritish during the war) was due to German money and influence 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire 27 

in Turkey. But the fruits of this great project are to be reaped 
primarily by the regions through which the railroad runs, and the 
regions which have railway communication connecting with it as 
a trunk line; and, secondarily, by international trade. This rail- 
road would run when completed through the dominions of several 
powers, and therefore ought, as much as Constantinople and the 
Dardanelles, to be internationalized. Whatever the powers given 
to any mandatory under the League of Nations Covenant, as- 
suming it to come into operation, one of such powers to be ex- 
pressly stipulated in the decree appointing the mandatory, should 
be the governmental power of consenting to the internationaliza- 
tion of such an important commercial trade route. 

Conclusion 
To sum up: 

1. Turkey should be shorn of her suzerainty over the four 
groups above enumerated. 

2. The Armenian Republic should be recognized with the prob- 
ably immediate result that much of the Turkish population within 
its new boundaries will remove itself to the Turkish districts of 
Anatolia, and the Armenians scattered through Anatolia and the 
remaining fragment of European Turkey may be expected to re- 
turn in large numbers to their native land. The Greeks of the 
Black Sea littoral have always been on good terms with the 
Armenians, and there is no reason why they should not become 
willing subjects of the new Armenian state. In fact, the present 
Greek government has expressed its willingness to have the Greeks 
of Pontus attached to an independent Armenia. 

In respect to both of these groups it is well to repeat what has 
been elsewhere asserted, that the mere fact that the United States 
might be a mandatary for the new Armenia would not mean that 
it would be the sole link between Armenia and the world. French 
influence or French capital might have free access to the new 
republic, and at the expiration of the period fixed in the mandate 
to the United States, the people would be free to relate themselves 
to any sphere of influence and to have accepted as their creditor any 
power whose business men are willing to make their investments 
in the new dominion. No mandatary in addition to accepting 
the responsibilities laid upon it of preserving order, of developing 



^8 The Annals oy the American Academy 

a stable government, would for a moment reject the capital 
that might be offered, from whatever source, in the development 
of|such*resources and in assisting to put the new nation upon a 
sound self-supporting basis. The selection of the mandatary 
should depend largely on its disinterestedness and the implied 
guarantee that it will not endeavor to exploit the province for its 
own profit. 

3. Whether the province of Syria could become a nation in as 
short a time as that of Armenia is doubtful, because of the diverse 
and heterogeneous elements to be dealt with and of the fact that 
Syria has been the stamping ground for contending races, religions 
and armies since the days of Rameses, Thotsmes, Tiglath Pileser 
and Assur bani Pal. The rocks above the Dog River at Beirut still 
retain records of the achievements of these great warriors, and at 
one time had graven upon them a record by Napoleon, which was 
afterwards, it was reported, chiseled out by direction of the 
British! But under the influences of education the Syrians have 
developed a high degree of intelligence, alertness and ability and 
are fully capable, if internal jealousies and factions do not impede 
or prevent their national development, of becoming a self-sustain- 
ing nation. 

I do not agree with the claims of Prince Faisul that the Arab 
kingdom should include Syria. Arabia is huge. Its interior 
table-land has vast possibilities if capital and industry are admitted 
to develop its resources. Syria is a separate entity, has distinctive 
resources and ought not to be relinquished to the intolerance of 
purely Moslem rule. I confess I do agree with Faisul's objection 
to a French protectorate. He points to northern Africa and says 
that while French colonial government is benign and orderly it 
does not develop the people governed into good Arabs but into 
"first-class sham Frenchmen. " The Oriental mind is keen and in 
this instance his analysis is profound. Mr. Lewis S. Gannett 
thinks Prince Faisul as the leader of the Arab army should be 
selected as the ruler of Syria. I believe such a selection would be 
unwise as tending to the ultimate aggrandizement of the king- 
dom of Arabia, and not in the real interests of separate Syrian 
autonomy. 

4. As to the kingdom of Arabia — it is a question; whether it 
would require to be under the tutelage of a mandatary of a league 



The Future of the Ottoman Empire ^9 

of nations. They do not ask military protection. They have all 
the seacoast their commercial needs require. It would be interest- 
ing if, under international recognition they were protected from 
outside attack, and coming into the sisterhood of nations, were 
required to abandon their exclusion of outside influences, and 
were subjected to the civilizing processes of Christian education. 
They might renew then their title to international respect and 
achieve a position of dignity and power among the nations of the 
world. 



The Turks and the Future of the Near East 

By Morris Jastrow, Jr., Ph.D., LL.D. 

University of Pennsylvania 

T^HE Eastern Question, wliich is primarily involved in any dis- 
"*■ cussion regarding the future of the Turks, may be called the 
ghost that stalks across the hall at Paris in which the representa- 
tives of the great nations are at present assembled for deliberation 
at a crisis in the world's history; and there is only one of those 
nations that can address the ghost and truthfully say, 

"Thou canst not say I did it. 
Shake not thy gory locks at me. " 

That nation is the United States. Let us be fair even to the 
Turk, and recognize at the outset that but for the diplomatic 
game played by all the Great Powers of Europe in the past — 
England, France, Germany, Russia, Italy, without exception — 
the ghost would have been laid years ago. Acting entirely from 
motives of expediency, instead of basing their diplomatic policy 
on principle, when at the close of the eighteenth century the def- 
inite decline of Turkey brought the Eastern Question to an acute 
stage, the European Powers alternately supported the "Sick 
Man of Europe" or administered a dose in the hope of hastening 
his demise. The famous remark of Lord Salisbury after the 
Crimean War, in which he apologized — as it were — for England's 
taking what turned out to be the wrong side, by declaring that 
she had unfortunately backed the wrong horse, is characteristic 
of the policy that was pursued in regard to Turkey by all the 
Powers. It was a question not of the right side, but of the win- 
ning side. Rivalry between England and France dictated the 
policy of both nations towards the Eastern Question, just as 
Russia's ambitions in the East engendered the attitude both of 
the Powers that favored Russia and of those that opposed her. 
Germany, directly responsible for the latest phase of the Eastern 
Question, which was the root of the present war, was merely play- 
ing the same game that had previously been played alternately 
by Russia, England and France. Each endeavored to secure an 

30 



The Turks and the Future of the Near East 31 

advantage for herself through the decHne of Turkish prestige, 
without much reference to what was equitable towards the people 
within the Turkish Empire. 

It is, therefore, the severest condemnation of the old style 
European diplomacy in the East — and which, it is to be feared, is 
not quite dead — that we should be confronted today by an appall- 
ing situation in Asia Minor, Mespotamia and Arabia; that in the 
twentieth century we should witness such a tragedy as that of 
Armenia; that in a part of the world where a high order of civiliza- 
tion flourished thousands of years ago, large portions of the popu- 
lation should today be sunk in the depths of ignorance. Such 
occurrences and conditions are not to be explained as due solely 
to Turkish misrule — disastrous as this misrule has been — nor can 
they be entirely accounted for through Turkey's neglect to provide 
any proper system of education for the peoples within her domain. 
In part, at least, the conditions in Asia Minor and in adjacent 
countries are the result of the kind of diplomatic policy followed 
by European Powers concerned for their own interests and actu- 
ated by motives of rivalry, or fear of a predominating influence of 
one power over a portion or the whole of the Near East. Rival- 
ries among European Powers, abetted by intrigues on the part of 
others, succeeded just a year before the outbreak of the Great 
War in breaking up the Balkan League, which was the creation 
of the eminent Greek statesman, Venizelos, and which came near 
to settling the Turkish Question in 1912. Had the league been 
maintained intact, Germany's plans for the domination of the 
Near East would have been foiled, with Servia and Bulgaria 
blocking the road to Bagdad; and who knows but that the war 
of 1914-1918, which Germany risked in order to carry out her 
plans, might have been averted .^^ 

All that, however, is past history. What of the future.^* What 
can be done for a section of the world which has suffered from an 
inefficient government, from corruption, from extortion, from 
neglect and, not least of all, from exploitation on the part of the 
European Powers and their representatives.'* Will we avail our- 
selves of the opportunity presented by the end of the war for 
solving the question of Turkey and Asia Minor on the basis of 
principle instead of on diplomatic expediency .^^ 



32 The Annals of the American Academy 

Early History of Asia Minor 

A significant feature in the history of Asia Minor has been the 
part played by that region as the great passageway from the more 
remote East of migratory hordes driven by pressure from the rear. 
Now the natural trend of these hordes is towards the south and not 
northwards. The Turks, who obtained a strong hold in Asia 
Minor in the eleventh century, would have been confined to ex- 
tending themselves within this region and to branching out south- 
wards, had it not been for the internal quarrels of the Byzantine 
Empire, which led one of the rulers in 1S41 to call upon the 
Turks to assist him in the struggle against a rival. Geographic 
conditions in Asia Minor are not favorable towards the formation 
of a great central empire. The country is cut up by mountain 
ranges, mostly running north and south. It is separated by a 
formidable mountain range from what is known as the "fertile 
crescent," the strip along the Mediterranean which is the bridge 
connecting the African continent with Asia, and which as it leaves 
the Mediterranean forms a crescent, the other end of which runs 
along the Euphrates to the Persian Gulf. This "fertile crescent, " 
the seat of an advanced civilization thousands of years ago, with 
the Euphrates Valley at the one end and the Nile Valley at the 
other, has always been a magnet attracting the northern hordes 
that passed from some eastern region into Asia Minor. But in 
Asia Minor itself no empire was ever formed that succeeded in 
welding the various nationalities of the region into a definite and 
permanent union. We must here also be fair to the Turk, and 
recognize that his failure to establish a strong empire in Asia 
Minor was not due entirely to his inefliciency, but in part to 
natural conditions, which even Greece and Rome failed to over- 
come. Even the old Hittites, a most warlike people, who ruled 
in Asia Minor about fifteen hundred years before this era, never 
had complete control of it. Moreover, the mixed population of 
Asia Minor added another barrier to the natural one, for an at- 
tempt to weld a heterogeneous population into a larger nationalis- 
tic or political unit lay beyond the political horizon of antiquity. 
It is distinctly a modern and more particularly a western point of 
view that prompts us to make the endeavor — as is done on so 
large a scale in this country — of uniting a variety of nationalities 
and of various races into a political unit. Even a small island like 



The Turks and the Future of the Near East 33 

Great Britain includes three nationalities, English, Scotch and 
Welsh, each distinct in origin, but together forming a great nation. 
In ancient times such a process was impossible, and the East has 
always been behind the West in that respect. Despite the great 
contributions of the ancient and of the later East to civilization, 
politically it has always lagged. For this reason it is hardly 
presumable that within any conceivable period a movement for the 
political combination of the different ethnic elements — not to 
speak of differences of religion — in Asia Minor and the contiguous 
countries, Syria, Palestine, Mesopotamia and Arabia, would have 
any chance of success. Perhaps in the far distant future, when 
under western influences more advanced political ideas make 
their way through the East, a federation of the nationalities of 
Asia Minor may be possible, but for the present we must deal with 
conditions as they have developed historically in that region. 
This suggests a division into a number of states according to 
geographical and ethnic boundaries. 

Mesopotamia 

Beginning with countries contiguous to Asia Minor it must, of 
course, be evident that Mesopotamia can be expected to flourish 
only if organized as a separate state under the tutelage either of an 
international commission or of a western mandatory power. The 
Euphrates Valley, with its northern extension along the banks of 
the Tigris up to the point to which the Tigris is navigable, has 
always formed an independent state along natural geographical 
lines. To this day the population in Mesopotamia, to use the 
conventional though somewhat inaccurate designation, is much 
more homogeneous than the rest of Asia Minor. To a large extent 
the population represents the descendants of the old Babylonians 
and Assyrians, though with considerable mixtures, in the course of 
ages, of other peoples, notably of Persians, Turks and Syrians, not 
to speak of large Christian settlements composed of those belong- 
ing to Indo-European races. English influence has been pro- 
nounced in Mesopotamia, particularly in the southern portion, 
ever since the end of the eighteenth century. A good deal of 
educational work has already been done among the population 
through missionary efforts in Bagdad, Mosul and elsewhere. On 
the whole, conditions are much more stable in Mesopotamia 

4 



34 The Annals of the American Academy 

(except for the outlying marshy districts in the south) than, for 
example, they are in Arabia. During the years just preceding the 
outbreak of the war, English engineers, under the leadership of Sir 
William Willcocks,^ were active in building the first of a great series 
of contemplated barrages, the cost of which would in time have 
been more than repaid by the increased yield of the land. The 
first of these barrages was actually completed in December, 
1913, and ready for operation; and no doubt English enterprise 
will see to it that the work, which will transform a neglected 
country into a veritable paradise that marked it in ancient 
times, will be carried on under peaceful and more auspicious con- 
ditions. With the establishment of an orderly government, with 
the introduction of a system of education and with the regulation 
of the finances of the country, we may expect Mesopotamia to play 
an important part in the resuscitation of the East under western 
tutelage. 

Arabia 

Coming next to Arabia, one gathers the impression that that 
vast region is at present very much in the same condition in which 
it was prior to the appearance of the Prophet Mohammed in the 
seventh century — broken up into districts under the control of 
tribes, without much semblance of unity among them. Since the 
outbreak of the war, a portion of Arabia, which contains the two 
sacred cities, Mecca and Medina, has made itself independent; 
and the authority of the Sherif (or, as he is called in European 
parlance, "king") of Hedjaz has been recognized by England. 
It may be that by once more transferring the headship of the 
Moslem Church from Constantinople to Mecca the political 
union of Arabia will be brought about. Such a union, however, 
will demand a strong personality, and if such a one should arise 
there would also be the possible danger of outbursts of Islamic 
fanatics, seized with the idea — as were the followers of Mohammed 
— of spreading Islam by force of arms. The religious question, 
which can hardly be separated from the rise of a large empire in 
Arabia, requires delicate handling. Even at the present time, 
despite the existence of a railroad up to Medina — and which 

1 Sir WDliam Willcocks, Irrigation of Mesopotamia (London, 1911). The 
full plan calls for six barrages at a total cost of 29 million Turkish liras. 



The Turks and the Future of the Near East 35 

eventually is to reach Mecca — a non-Moslem cannot enter either 
of the sacred cities under pain of death. This of itself shows 
how difficult the task will be of bringing Arabia under the in- 
fluence of modern and western ideas. For the present, nothing 
further can be done than to aid the Sherif or the King of Hedjaz 
to establish order in the country controlled by him, and to make 
sure of the establishment of a decent government in southern 
Arabia or Yemen which, it is fair to assume, will not be willing to 
recognize the supremacy of any ruler of the Hedjaz. 

Palestine and Syria 

In Palestine and Syria the situation is much simpler. Condi- 
tions are more favorable in both these countries for a rapid recov- 
ery from misrule and neglect, because they have come during the 
past half century more directly under western influences than 
other parts of Asia Minor, in part through settlements of Euro- 
peans — Christians and Jews — attracted to the country because of 
its historical association or for other reasons, and in part through 
educational efforts in which our own country has taken an impor- 
tant and distinguished part. In the success of the Protestant 
college at Beirut, of Robert College of Constantinople and the 
schools established in various parts of Palestine and Syria, by 
English, American and French missionaries — to which we must 
add the activities of the Alliance Israelite Universelle in organ- 
izing schools for Jewish children in various parts of Palestine — ■ 
one sees the beginning of a genuine solution of the Eastern Ques- 
tion. Such educational efforts interpreted aright the real mean- 
ing of the decline of the Turkish Empire as affording an oppor- 
tunity for western lands to bring about a resuscitation of the 
East. 2 

Western Influence 

The country is there — ^Palestine, Syria, Mesopotamia — as it 
was thousands of years ago. The physical conditions are the 
same, the people even, to a large extent, are the descendants of 
those who produced a high order of civilization millenniums ago. 
All that is needed to bring about a resuscitation is to reproduce 
the favorable conditions that existed in the "fertile crescent" in 

^ I have endeavored to set this idea forth in greater detail in my book The 
War and the Bagdad Railway, pages 138-152. 



36 The Annals of the American Academy 

antiquity. In Egypt through a broad liberal policy, involving the 
education of the people, England has changed an utterly neglected 
and ruined country into a great center of modern activity, with 
western influences and western methods dominating the life of 
the people. This may be taken as an index of the changes for the 
better that will be wrought in Palestine and Syria once those 
countries are more completely brought under the sway of western 
ideas of education, western methods of government, western 
sanitation, and western commercial and industrial activity. 

This brings me to my main point, to wit: That the resuscita- 
tion of the East, which alone would furnish a satisfactory solution 
of the Turkish Question in Asia Minor and adjacent countries, 
cannot be accomplished without the direct support of the western 
powers — precisely as Egypt, Algiers and Tunis have been so 
vastly benefited through the two great western powers. Great 
Britain and France. What applies to Mesopotamia, Arabia, 
Palestine and Syria is also applicable to Armenia, which will with- 
out question be organized as an independent state through the 
efforts of the Peace Conference. Armenia, too, needs to be 
brought under western influences. The intelligence of the Arme- 
nian population is such that by their own initiative they promoted 
educational efforts among the population, even while they were 
under Turkish dominion. It will, therefore, not be long before, 
with the support of the West, an orderly form of government will 
be established, a proper system of education introduced, and steps 
taken for the building of necessary roads and railroads, and for 
otherwise improving the internal conditions. Armenia, we may 
feel assured, will welcome western influence, whatever shape 
that influence may take. 

The Reconstitution of Turkey 

Assuming that the reorganization of an Armenian state will 
cover the eastern part of Asia Minor, running from the Black Sea 
just east of Samsun, diagonally in a southwestern direction with an 
outlet on the Mediterranean, the part to the west up to the Ae- 
gean should properly be set aside for the reconstitution of Turkey 
in Asia Minor. The Turks belong to this region, in which they 
had been settled for almost a millennium before they crossed over 
into Europe. Here in Asia Minor they established, under the 



The Turks and the Future of the Near East St 

Selyuk branch, a government which prior to the coming of the 
Ottoman Turks, had made notable contributions to civilization, 
more particularly in the domain of architecture and the decorative 
arts. But the Turks themselves, as the history of Turkey since 
the revolution of 1908 has shown, need to be placed, for a time at 
least, under western tutelage. The young Turkish party has 
bitterly disappointed the high hopes that were set in it. It lent 
itself to political intrigues of an even more mischievous character 
than those which characterized the regime of Abdul Hamid. 
The young Turkish party gave a helping hand to Germany's 
sinister scheme for the political dominion of the Near East. They 
were willing to see Turkey reduced to the role of a mere pawn in the 
hands of Imperial Germany. It is generally said that a people 
has the government that it deserves. An exception must be made 
in the case of the Turks, who have always been better than their 
government. The testimony of those who have lived for a long 
time in Turkey and who know the Turk best bears witness to the 
fact that, when not stirred up to fanaticism by a crafty and in- 
triguing government, the Turk shows many good traits. He has 
always suffered by having a government that was dishonest as 
well as inefficient. The peace of the world would again be in 
danger if we allowed the Turks in Asia Minor to fall under the in- 
fluence of crafty and scheming leaders. For self -protection as 
well as for the betterment of the Turk, we must place Asia Minor 
under western tutelage. 

The Tutelage of the East 

Now, how should this tutelage over Turkey in Asia Minor, 
over Armenia, over Palestine, Syria, Mesopotamia and Arabia 
be exercised? My own feeling, based upon many years of study 
of the ancient and modern Orient, and which I have endeavored to 
set forth in various publications, is decidedly in favor of a tutelage 
of the East under the guise of international commissions. I 
cannot help feeling that things would be safer and that economic, 
political and educational development in Asia Minor and in ad- 
jacent countries would be more normal if it were possible to place 
these countries under the protection of the League of Nations, 
with international commissions established in each of them as the 
directing hand in constructing democratic forms of government, in 



38 The Annals of the American Academy 

educating the people to self-government, in regulating finances 
and in promoting economic growth. The disposition, however, 
of those to whose hands we have entrusted the regulation of in- 
ternational affairs at the Peace Conference appears to be in favor 
of handing over each one of the countries involved to a single power 
entrusted by the league with mandatory authority. ^ If this view 
should finally prevail there are only three countries among which 
the mandatory power for the Near East can be distributed — 
England, France and the United States — for Italy is hardly 
prepared to undertake at present a work of such character. It 
would be admittedly unfortunate both for England as well as 
for the world if she alone were to be the mandatory power for the 
entire Near East. If she accepts the commission for Mesopotamia, 
Arabia and Palestine, she will have her hands completely filled. 
France, it is generally believed, will not care to extend her manda- 
tory power beyond Syria, in which she has for the past sixty years 
and more taken a special interest and where she has done so much 
to improve conditions and to safeguard the lives of the population. 

The Responsibilities of the United States 

There remains, then, the question whether the United States 
should accept the mandatory power for Armenia and for the re- 
constituted Turkish state in Asia Minor. I exclude Constanti- 
nople for there appears to be a general consensus of opinion that it 
should be placed under the control, for the present at least, of an 
international commission, somewhat similar to the International 
Danube Commission, established by the Peace Conference of 
1856. I venture to think that if the offer is made to this country 
to undertake the task of political guardianship over a portion of 
the Near East it will be impossible for us to refuse. And that for 
two reasons. In the first place, we are pledged in a measure by 
the valuable constructive work that we have done in the domain of 
education for the countries of the Near East to continue such 

' It is to be hoped that an exception will at all events be made in the case of the 
Bagdad Railway, the affairs of which ought not to be placed in the hands of any 
single western power. The enterprise should be internationalized with a board 
of directors composed of representatives of various countries. Had such an 
organization been effected at the inception of the railway, the pan-Germanic 
scheme would never have been developed. See further on this point, Jastrow, 
The War and the Bagdad Railway, page 146. 



The Turks and the Future of the Near East 39 

beneficent activities. This kind of activity indicates the attitude 
of America towards the East; and it should be a source of justifi- 
able pride for us to realize that the European powers have per- 
ceived the necessity of aiding the East to recover some of her lost 
prestige as the policy that must be substituted for mere political 
power and commercial exploitation. There is no reason why 
that which has been done so successfully by Americans unofficially 
should not be carried on officially under the direct auspices of our 
government. 

Furthermore, it is impossible to suppose that the world can pass 
through such an upheaval as the last war and leave any great 
nation like ours in the same position of isolation from world 
politics as we lived in before this war. We are forced by circum- 
stances beyond our control to participate in the momentous 
problems at present engaging the attention of the conference at 
Paris. We were drawn into the war after it had been going on for 
over two years and a half. In case of another international con- 
flict it is almost a certainty that we will again be involved. We 
must, therefore, from motives of self -protection participate in the 
present deliberations to solve international problems, with which 
we as a nation have no direct concern, both because of our part 
in the war that has come to an end and because in the event of 
another conflict we certainly will want to have something to say 
at the time of its breaking out. We must, therefore, be willing 
to take a share of responsibility for conditions in the Near East, 
because the East has been and will continue to be one of the danger 
zones. Prior to the war of 1914-1918, there were two other inter- 
national conflicts, the Crimean War of 1854 and the Russo- 
Turkish War of 1876-1877, in which the European Powers were 
all directly or indirectly involved and which broke out over the 
Eastern Question. 

One can well understand the hesitation of many thoughtful 
people in this country at the prospect of our becoming involved 
in the problems of the East. But the answer to all such objections 
must be that we cannot shirk the opportunity of aiding in the 
resuscitation of the East, if such an opportunity comes to us. It 
would, to be sure, be no gain to this country to undertake the 
mandatory direction for Armenia and western Asia Minor; and it 
is possible that we may also be asked to undertake the guardiari- 



40 The Annals of the American Academy 

ship of Constantinople. It would be, however, a great oppor- 
tunity for service, for continuing on a larger scale and in an official 
capacity what we began more than half a century ago by establish- 
ing educational institutions in the East through missionary 
and other private efforts. If there is such a thing as destiny in 
the fortunes of a people, events at present would seem to point to 
our undertaking a part of the work of the resuscitation of the East. 
New conditions always involve new duties. If the conference 
should decide on the plan of mandatory powers for the countries 
of the Near East, instead of international commissions which, let 
me emphasize once more, appears to me to be the far better and 
safer plan, we must be willing to take our share and to render 
further service in the work of progress and enlightenment to 
which this country has been committed ever since its birth. 



The Disposition of the Turkish Empire 

By Talcott Williams, LL. D. 

School of Journalism, Columbia University 

^T^HE disposition of the territory now composing the Turkish 
-*■ Empire does not dispose of the Turk. Nearly all plans for 
the division of Turkey into new states overlook the fact that the 
Moslem population of Turkey is at least four-fold the Christian 
population. Force from without would be necessary to dis- 
franchise and hold down the Moslem — a task which the Christian 
population would be wholly unable to achieve. This Christian 
population is certain to be in a majority in only sections of the 
Turkish Empire in Asia. In but one of the vilayets or depart- 
ments in Asia Minor, namely Smyrna, it is in a fair majority of 
about 50,000 in a population of 750,000. In nearly all other parts 
of the littoral of Asia Minor the Turk holds a majority in every 
unit save possibly one city, Trebizond. The Armenian is in the 
minority in every vilayet and in every city except two and these 
are smaller sized. The Armenian provinces of Russia added to 
the Turkish vilayets, in which there is a strong proportion of 
Armenians, give a total in favor of the Armenians. In Syria the 
Moslem is in a majority of at least four, probably five, to one. 
Taking the country around Syria and Palestine a vote would place 
a Moslem government in control. In Syria, however, the Moslem 
population is Arab. In Armenia, with small fractions of Turks, 
the Moslem population is Kurdish. In Asia Minor, out of a 
population of 10,000,000 there are about 7,000,000 Turks. These 
fill the center of Asia Minor so completely that the Christian 
population is negligible; they are in a majority along the^entire 
coast districts of Asia Minor, except part of the Cilician plain, 
already pointed out as Smyrna, the vilayet of which it is the center, 
and Trebizond. 

This population of 7,000,000 Turks is the core and power, the 
strength which has given the Ottoman race its supremacy in the 
Ottoman Empire. However, the question presented by Turkey 
cannot be limited by Turkey. The Turkish race began to play 
its part in history in 732 A. D., when it was a strong and fully 

41 



42 The Annals of the American Academy 

organized state on the borders of Kansu, a northeastern province 
of China. It already had a written language, a language still 
spoken by the Youruks of Asia Minor. This race expanded 
until it reached Constantinople on one side and Peking on the 
other, and there have been periods in which it ruled both and all 
the lands between. 

It is possible today to start from the gates of Scutari, a suburb 
of Constantinople, and ride to the gates of Peking and in the long 
journey of 9000 miles never be more than two days from a village 
in which Turkish is spoken. No other tongue in the world has 
this span. No other has so nearly preserved its solid foundation 
of ancient Turkish, and assimilated a vocabulary for the purposes 
of faith and philosophy drawn from Arabic in its roots, and in 
administration and in letters from Persia. The only language 
which compares with it in this lingual structure is English, with 
its basis of Saxon, its addition of Norman and French and its 
assimilation of a great vocabulary obtained directly or indirectly 
from the two classic tongues of antiquity. This Turkish race once 
held Asia in fee. It has ruled in China, it conquered the Abbas- 
side, Caliphate in Bagdad in the eleventh century, and four and a 
half centuries later it reached the Danube. Even three centuries 
ago, there was a period when different branches of this race were 
dominant from the headwaters of the Danube to the mouth of 
the Amur. Cruel, relentless, murderous, stained with historic 
crimes, no race with the record, with the staying power, the 
independence, the sobriety and the decision of the Turk can be 
set aside as negligible in the history of the world. Tolerant in 
the period from the fifteenth to eighteenth century — when 
European countries remorsely crushed all dissenters, from the 
expulsion of the Moors and Jews from Spain to the expulsion of 
the Huguenots from France — Turkey tolerated in its empire races 
alien in language, in religion and in culture. Among them the 
Armenian was the oldest and most powerful, and still possesses 
ability and knowledge, unmatched by any other race in the 
Turkish Empire. 

The result of this early tolerance was that Turkey has been guilty 
in this very decade of massacre and deportation, once familiar in 
Europe, but now justly condemned. The Turk has lost the right 
to rule. He is condemned by the civilized world. He will never 



Disposition of the Turkish Empire 43 

be allowed to exercise political power or rule in our generation 
over any subject race. 

But it is not possible either to deport or to massacre the Turk. 
He remains the largest single factor in the Turkish Empire, 
7,000,000 strong in the field and cities of Asia Minor. While 
other races are nowhere in an unbroken majority, the Turk covers 
the center of Asia Minor and at more than one point overflows to 
its coast. Ignorant, without mercy, likely to explode in massacre, 
knowing nothing of modern civilization, he has been led to de- 
struction by those of his own race who were "Made in Germany." 
The failure of the Turkish Empire began when Abdul Hamid sent 
his young officers to be trained in German military schools and 
added relentless methods of Prussianism to the sporadic and 
fanatic massacre. 

If the Turkish Empire were held together and administered as 
a whole the Turkish race would surely but slowly come to the front. 
If the Turkish Empire be divided, there will remain in the central 
strategic point of Asia Minor a race which multiplies as fast as 
other races — some think faster — solid, calm, warlike, but needing 
civilization in order to equal that period in its past when it assimi- 
lated the art and letters of Persia, the faith and philosophy of the 
Arab, and the law and administration of the Roman Empire. 

A recent proposal from England is that the Turks of Asia 
Minor shall be organized as a protected state under the rule of 
the house of Seljuk — whose last representative still lives at Konia 
(though at present an exile at Beirut) and represents the ancient 
glory, the serene faith and urban manners of the old Turk. Such 
a state would be not unlike the realm ruled by the Nizam of 
Hyderbad in India and it would be twice as large in area. It 
would have a far stronger population and in another generation 
its army would be the strongest within the current boundary 
of Turkey. The presence of such a Moslem state, once its leaders 
were educated and its people had gained the advantages of civili- 
zation, would be a perpetual menace to all the Christian states 
about it. It would have sympathies with Bulgaria and Hungary. 
It would be the hope of the Moslem populations of the empire. 
Nothing but a league of nations strong enough to suppress war 
could prevent an eventual explosion. 

This centrg-l kingdom looking out on the Mediterranean, the 



44 The Annals of the American Academy 

Aegean and the Black Sea would be also the natural center, the 
leader of the entire Turkish race across Asia. This race today — 
ignorant for the most part, without laws, with a Moslem faith 
for many still little more than superstition, and an economy and 
culture similar to that of a thousand years ago — would in due 
time develop a spirit of race. The Turkish question then would 
loom large across the whole distance which separates the Far 
East from the Near East. The first consciousness of this is ap- 
parent in the attempt at a union between Afghanistan and the 
Central Asian Khanates. 

Whatever solution we propose we come back to the great fact 
that the disorganized condition of Turkey is such that any 
arrangement which does not provide a fostering rule for all these 
different races and tongues, until education and civilization have 
made federation possible, renders certain some collision in the 
future. This is certain whether Turkey be divided into integral 
or autonomous parts, or be partitioned among many European 
nations, or part partitioned, and part held under European flags, 
Constantinople meanwhile being an internationalized city. 

The primal difficulty through all this is that the Turkish Em- 
pire is not an accident, but an integral and economic unit composed 
of the plateaus, of Armenia, of Kurdistan, of Asia Minor; an 
Asian steppe dotted with lakes, with its two rivers of Mesopotamia, 
and last the Syrian coasts. For prosperity, for development, for 
civilization and for lasting peace these different portions need each 
other, and have not in a history of four thousand years ever been 
separated without a final and inevitable union. 

Divide the Turkish Empire and economic disaster is inevitable. 
Divide it between European powers and in due season you will 
have a group of Polands. Set Christian minorities long subject 
to govern warlike Turkish majorities and explosions will follow. 
Carve out, as can be done by adding Russian Armenia to Turkish 
Armenia, an area with narrow Armenian majorities and an unstable 
equilibrium is certain, with a costly rule entailing heavy taxes. Do 
this in Asia Minor for vilayets partly Greek and you will have be- 
tween these two unstable areas, a solid Moslem population, certain 
to gravitate to an irredenta movement and worse than Balkan wars 
will follow. Imagine the area from Maine to Nebraska and Dakota 
with New England 45 per cent Moslem ruled by 55 per cent Greek, 



Disposition of the Turkish Empire 45 

and in Minnesota and Iowa 55 per cent of Armenians ruling 45 per 
cent of Moslems and the region between pretty nearly solid Moslem 
with 10 per cent Christian. Would there seem to you a stable 
basis for peace in the future over such a region without schools or 
railroads and embittered by racial and religious wars for a thou- 
sand years? Map drawing will not solve this problem. 

None of these difficulties, however, is any excuse or pretext 
for Moslem rule over any Christian populations. This cannot be. 
As German and Austrian have forfeited the right to rule any 
subject races, so has the Turk for worse reason and greater crimes. 
Germany and Austria at least brought order and a more advanced 
civilization. Not the Turk. He has destroyed all that he built. 
His economic failure is as complete as his administration by mas- 
sacre. The Turkish Empire is gone, never to return. The Turk 
remains, economically incapable. His taxation of subject races 
is as ruinous as his pillages. Great in a distant past, he has no 
future until schools, justice and order have again developed his 
race. Today he is without modern economic assets of any kind, 
except a dagged industry in the field and some capacity as a re- 
tailer in the city. Into the modern economic world, he has 
never entered. His religion itself .is a bar. Trader in the dawn 
of his race, he has not advanced. 

The Turkish Empire has gone after six centuries, four of con- 
quest and two of defeat. Turkish territory remains, offering the 
world's most insoluble problem — racial, civil and economic. Both 
race and territory are bankrupt. Here is an area as large as New 
England, the Middle States, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, 
Michigan, Minnesota and Nebraska. It includes lands as fertile, 
mineral resources, except in coal, as great. It has the only coal 
in the Mediterranean. It holds a situation without parallel on 
the earth's surface, linking three continents, connecting the seas 
of Central Asia, the Black Sea and the Mediterranean to the 
Indian Ocean, and offering the shortest sea and rail route from the 
two great city centers of Asia in China and India with the great 
city center of Europe from Moscow to London. No possibilities 
today are greater and no reality more desperate. A census does 
not exist. Estimates based on poll-tax returns, corrupt, unreli- 
able, manipulated, run to a population for this entire region of 
20,000,000 in most books of reference, The calculation made 



46 The Annals of the American Academy 

ten years ago, when for a brief season there was sanity, purpose 
and patriotism in the conduct of Turkish affairs at Constantinople, 
reduced the famiHar estimate of 20,000,000 to 15,000,000. 
Today, I beHeve the population of Turkey is not more than 
10,000,000. The land is empty. The war alone has cost 1,000,- 
000 lives in hostile operations. Massacres, famine and pestilence 
have slain at least 3,000,000 at the lowest and most moderate 
estimate. Refugees come back to tell me that a city which I 
knew in childhood with 40,000 inhabitants has but 6,000, with 
empty houses where dogs are devouring the dead, under the great 
basalt walls behind which Bdisarius withstood the shock and 
assault of Sapor, 1,400 years ago. In Mosul, cannibalism was 
rife last winter and the remains of six children, used for food were 
found in one house. "I do not expect you to believe this," runs 
a letter, "but I speak of what I know and have seen." The 
country-side is empty; brigandage is rife; the fields untilled. 
Great wastes stretch between what were once the lines of Russian, 
Turkish and English troops fighting for the empire for four years, 
wastes once populous. 

This whelming disaster leaves this entire region without re- 
sources. Domestic animals are gone, neat cattle, horses, mules 
and asses destroyed for army food and transport, fruit trees 
ruthlessly cut under the direction of German officers to keep 
moving the solitary railroad which connects the capital with the 
interior and beyond to Arabia and its branches, a line 3,000 miles 
in all for a region that would cover our maps from Maine to the 
Mississippi. (The aggregate mileage of Massachusetts and 
Connecticut spreads over 600,000 square miles or eleven of our 
states.) By Moslem law, fruit trees have been sacred in war for 
1,200 years and were spared when massacre swept away popula- 
tion. The German officer spared nothing. The entire area has 
been swept of metals. Fire has taken whole quarters of cities. 
Irrigation channels are dry. Seed-corn is absent. In whole 
districts everything woven has been seized to clothe troops. 
German system added to Turkish cruelty has left a land naked, 
peeled and forsaken. 

At best in peace, Turkey was poverty-stricken. The vain effort 
was made to raise $125,000,000 of revenue at the rate of $10 a 
head of the population, when $5 would have been rapacity. 



Disposition of the Turkish Empire 47 

Even Egypt raises only $8 per head after thirty-eight years of 
Enghsh administration. Of Turkish revenue 43 per cent went to 
a debt charge yearly growing. Every efficient means of raising 
revenue was turned over to European usurers who sucked the 
life-blood of the realm. Germany has added to all these heavy 
charges for war-supplies. The aggregate of the Turkish debt 
none can know. Of the interest on the old debt 62 per cent 
goes to French bondholders and 29 per cent to German. French 
concessions siphon off all the profits of the trams and the wharves 
of the ports. Such railroads as there are, have for twenty years 
paid bondholders at the expense of development and equipment. 
The Turkish government has been corrupt and cruel, but no 
administration the world over has ever functioned under 
such pressure of foreign plunder. This was worked under a 
machinery of bond and treaty pushed inexorably by diplomatic 
pressure. All the embassies looked only to the spoils of their 
nationals and their bond concessions, privileges and opportunities 
under tariffs, exemptions and exterritorial courts, always partial, 
and often corrupt which gave the lands, the investments, the 
industries and the products of Turkish subjects neither growth 
nor profit, neither justice nor protection. 

If Armenia be given a bare preponderance of Armenians by in- 
cluding Russian Armenians in a territory of about a quarter of 
Turkey, it will not for years be able to raise a revenue sufficient 
to meet current expenditures for civil necessities, let alone the 
needs of a costly armed gendarmerie to keep savage and armed 
Kurds — ^long superiors — in order. Syria has but fifteen persons 
to the square mile to tax; its 1,454 miles of railroads feeds 114,500 
square miles (New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachu- 
setts and Connecticut with the same area have 46,000 miles) and 
its coal costs $41 a ton — though oil in the new region opened by 
England in the Kerbuk Bagdan and Karun River oil-fields will 
give Turkey all the fuel wanted at a cheap rate. Here, as else- 
where the future of all this territory is secure, if it can once be 
freed from usurious European bondholders who have rolled up a 
debt of $750,000,000 to which Germany added $204,000,000 m 
the war. As it stands, at par value the debt would be $1,000,000,- 
000, or $500 per family on a population of not more than 10,000,000 
starving, in dire poverty and without resources. 



48 The Annals op the American Academy 

Kept together or divided, the territory of the Turkish Empire 
cannot be given an administration capable of sustaining develop- 
ment unless there is a large provision of new capital, whose 
future and whose security is certain, but whose credit and whose 
revenue must be provided for a decade to come or even more. 
This is the basic difficulty of the Turkish situation. Order can 
be easily gained and maintained. Conflicts between races and 
creeds can be adjusted. National aspirations can be secured by 
autonomy and local self-government until economic prosperity 
has come. The real difficulty is one of providing the capital by 
which any development is possible. This is not a new or untouched 
source, or one possessing forests, or vast water power. It is instead 
a territory long since cropped to the limit. In it is an area which 
could raise 300,000,000 bushels if it were once irrigated; it has min- 
eral resources which made it the early center of the development of 
metals through all the period before the Christian era, but a rain- 
fall barely sufficient for cultivation and needing the opening of irri- 
gation on a great scale, and by provision in the shape of cattle and 
machinery yet to be made for either agriculture or manufacture. 

These economic causes, not less than the jealousies between the 
European powers have led to the movement beginning in England 
and accepted by all Western Europe, proposing that the United 
States should be the mandatory to which the administration of 
the Ottoman Empire should be made. All the European countries 
are already carrying a debt which make new issues impracticable. 
The heavy losses of war have made all their man-power needed 
at home and they are without the capital necessary to develop a 
region whose development cannot for at least ten years meet the 
ordinary charges of government. 

If the region is divided into different areas — Armenia, Mesopo- 
tamia and Syria — if the interior of Asia Minor is going to the 
Turks, and the coast parceled between different powers, whether 
this division be between European Powers, or between subject 
races, the same difficulties are to be met, and the same economic 
needs to be provided. The instant these divisions are made 
questions arise sure to cause contention in regard to the proposed 
boundaries of Armenia, of Syria and of Asia Minor. In brief, it 
leaves the interior of Asia Minor in the hands of the Turks, and 
the coast under other powers an arrangement doomed to economic 
failure. 



Disposition of the Turkish Empire 49 

If Asia Minor be parceled into a Greek end to the West, an 
Italian colony in the South, and some division along the Black 
Sea, its railroad development will be impossible except with the 
costly lines that come from the competing and conflicting manage- 
ment of transportation. Whether this should be done on the 
basis of giving the Christian minority a rule over the Ottoman 
majority, or the effort be made to furnish Christian majorities by 
gathering the Turkish population into the center of Armenia and 
frankly accepting the majority of the Moslem in Syria, the same 
racial and economic difllculties will exist. The country instead 
of having one Balkan peninsula as in the past forty years — source 
of innumerable woes — will have a Balkanized area in the center 
of Europe, another Balkanized area in the Balkans, and a third 
Balkanized area in the Turkish dominion. 

Next November it will be one hundred years since American 
missionaries first landed in Turkey. During that period the 
American and his nation have been known only for works of mercy, 
of healing, charity, of education and of faith. The college edu- 
cation of Turkey in its most efiicient shape is in the hands of 
American colleges endowed by this country. Every city has its 
American hospital. All creeds and all races have confidence in 
the American. The United States is the only land which is looked 
upon as unselfish, having no ambitions, and representing a 
system which desires not empire over the earth, but freedom in 
the world. 

This sentiment is so strong that it alone would be more valuable 
in maintaining order than soldiers or gendarmerie. The security 
for the capital which would be invested, which would not be less 
than four or five billion dollars, would be the richest, the most 
fruitful and the best situated land on the earth's surface. What 
American administration can do has already been proved in the 
Philippines. Greater success would be met in Turkey. If this 
duty and this opportunity is declined — and the feeling against 
any enterprise of this order is strong in the United States — 
Turkey will be divided. The effort will be made to raise capital 
to organize governments, taxation will be heavy, resources will 
only be obtained at exorbitant rates of interest. Military ex- 
penditure will render a sound pledge as impossible as it has proved 
in the Balkan states, the army will play its share both in influence. 



50 The Annals oP the American Academy 

and in industrial development, jealousies will arise, and South- 
eastern Europe, and Southwestern Asia will again set the world 
in flames, as they have in the last five years. The United States, 
true to its traditions, will struggle to remain out of the whirlpool 
of war, it will fail as it has already failed, and in the end it will 
expend far more than would be necessary for the peaceful solution 
of the problem of the Turkish Empire. It would have only a debt 
charge to show instead of a new guarantee of peace in the solution 
of the Eastern Question through justice, science and the establish- 
ment of judicial rights. 



An Eyewitness of the Serbian Apotheosis 

By Madame Slavko Grouitch 

TDEING an American married to a Serbian and having spent 
'^ my early years in Europe as a traveller and student, it was 
as a cosmopolitan that I came to Serbia. Here for the first time 
in my European wanderings I had the impression of reaching 
home, so very similar were the conditions of life to those of my 
native state. West Virginia. The resemblance extended to the 
atmosphere of the home and to customs of farms and villages, but 
more particularly to that attitude of mind towards life which we 
consider peculiarly American, and which I may describe as liberty 
so great that it is not conscious of laws. The Serbian people have 
a conception of duty toward the state and a public spiritedness 
from choice which I have encountered elsewhere only in Switzer- 
land and the United States. No change was necessary in order 
to meet the women and men of my adopted country. They knew 
more about America than America did of them. 

I soon learned that the singleness of patriotic purpose which 
had impressed me in my husband was peculiar to everyone I met 
from King to peasant, from prime minister to goat's herdsman. 
All were dreaming, as their fore-fathers had dreamed for centuries, 
of a united Yugo-Slav kingdom which should include the whole 
13,000,000 of their race. As I listened I wondered. 

There were barely three and a half million souls in the little 
Serbia of that day. To the south there was a region spoken of as 
Old Serbia, because there had arisen the Serbian kingdom of the 
eleventh century; beyond that was the region we speak of as 
Macedonia (and which in my mind, until I became Serbian, had 
not been associated geographically with the Balkans) containing 
a million and a half inhabitants of pure Serbian race still under 
Turkish rule. I learned very quickly of loyal little Montenegro — 
proud of the fact that in the veins of every peasant was the blood 
of the heroes who had survived from the great battle of Kossovo 
in 1389, in which the Serbian people had lost their independence, 
all but that one towering citadel. I learned of Croatia, which I 
had, in common with most people, always thought of as a province 

51 



62 The Annals of the American Academy 

of Austria; of Dalmatia with its republican traditions; of the Adri- 
atic, a kind of Floridian Indian River bordered with pleasure 
resorts for the opulent Viennese. Very few people had ever 
realized until lately that this inland sea was as essential to the life 
of the peoples who bordered upon it as are the Atlantic and 
Pacific Oceans to the United States. 

As I listened to statesmen and people making prophecies of the 
day when all these would be united to. Serbia from that farthest 
point on the maps, called Carinthia, to that extreme point called 
Monastir, — I felt it could happen only a long time after I should 
have passed away. Nevertheless, within the period of fifteen 
years I have seen these dreams come true. I myself have wit- 
nessed the tragedies — and there have been many — which have 
brought about the conquest of Old Serbia and of Macedonia, the 
liberation of Croatia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Slovenia, and Dalma- 
tia, and also the invasion of Serbia and Montenegro during the 
war. I have seen the miracle accomplished, and the wonder of it 
is that it was brought about by impulsions as irresistible as those 
which "rule the stars and tides." Every little child felt them; 
every little child contributed; its mother tossed it playfully in the 
air naming the great Serbian battles in a nursery rhyme; its 
mother put it to bed in poverty and simplicity, teaching it how to 
live humbly but to think grandly, sublimely, patriotically. 

As the years went by and my diplomatic home was in Russia 
and afterwards in England — the two countries to which Serbia 
looked for aid in the achievement of her dream — I came only from 
time to time to my adopted people. But always their first words 
were of this wonderful thing that was in the bud, waiting to hap- 
pen — and yet, so far as I could see, with no preparation for it, any 
more than there is external action to hasten the coming of spring. 
In Serbia as well as in all the allied countries at that time there 
were hopes for arbitration on the questions of liberty of peoples 
and territorial boundaries. It was the period when the Czar and 
England made the most intense concessions in settlement of 
ancient disputes to unite in an Entente with France to prevent 
war. I watched this accord with a certain fear, because I felt 
that it surely would mean the buckling in of the aspirations of my 
adopted people. How were the Yugo-Slavs all to be freed and 
united if there were an Entente to preserve that present state of 
injustice? 



An Eyewitness of the Serbian Apotheosis 53 

The Great Entente was made in 1906. Shortly afterward I 
went home to Serbia. Naturally I talked with everyone I met of 
the new conditions. No one showed depression. The answer 
invariably was, "It will come about. It is bound to come." I 
was in England when in 1908 Austria-Hungary, as an act of defi- 
ance to the Entente, forcibly annexed the two provinces of Bosnia 
and Herzegovina. The whole Yugo-Slav nation went into mourn- 
ing for a deed that seemed to fasten the chains of despotism that 
much more firmly upon the greater portion of its race, but did not 
cease to repeat, "The hour of our deliverance will soon be at 
hand." Then came the war of 1912. I was sent on a mission here 
to my own country as the representative of the Serbian Red Cross, 
to ask aid for the sick and wounded soldiers who filled our hospi- 
tals. As a child I had heard from American missionaries of the 
horrors of the Turkish rule long before I had learned them from 
the stories of my adopted people who had suffered martyrdom at 
the hands of the Turks in Macedonia, and therefore I was aston- 
ished to find so little understanding of the causes of the Balkan 
war, so little sympathy for the suffering that was taking place in 
the Balkans. I believe the United States contributed ten times 
as much for relief to Turkey at that time as it contributed to any 
of the Balkan States. Again I asked myself, "Whence the help 
that is to liberate and unite Yugo-Slavia, if England, France, 
Russia, and America combine in the idea that no people shall ever 
again rise and call out for its own freedom?" 

In 1913 there came the terrible tragedy of the Serbian-Bulgarian 
war, when I saw our Balkan block torn asunder by the agonizing 
torment of civil war — for war between sister nations is surely civil 
war. It seemed to me then that the dream of liberty and union 
for the Yugo-Slavs would fade into yielding, as had been once 
before the case in Serbian history when the late King Milan 
declared that Serbia was in the position of a young woman who 
had a strong affection and inclination for one young suitor — in 
that case the suitor was Russia — but who must make a mariage de 
raison with Austria. A secret treaty that would afford to Serbia 
greater economic prosperity, at the expense of Yugo-Slav freedom, 
was concluded between the King, his ministers, and the Austro- 
Hungarian government. The result of that deflection from the 
dream was that the King had to abdicate, for the Serbian people 



54 The Annals of the American Academy 

repudiated a concession that should be for their material profit, 
but would enslave further their brethren in Austria-Hungary. 

In 1913, looking conditions in the face, I could not see the way 
out to freedom and union for the Slavs of Austria. The great 
nations of the Entente had decreed a long era of peace, for which 
the weak peoples must pay the price in self-restraint, humiliation, 
and degradation. 

Nowhere about me — in our own legation or in the allied coun- 
tries — had I heard the suggestion that the liberty bells would ring 
in July, 1914, for Yugo-Slavia as they had rung in July, 1776, for 
this country. But the dream began to come true. The first 
cannon shot across the Danube proclaimed that the hour had 
come; that the beginning had been made, made by Austria-Hun- 
gary herself in an attack on the free peoples of Serbia. The 
beginning was not made by dreams of freedom, for the enslaved 
peoples of Austria-Hungary had never descended to plans for 
ruthless slaughter of women and children, as was done by the 
bombardment of the Serbian capital before its population could 
flee towards the interior of the country. 

In the months that followed — when three times the Serbian 
people, though unaided by their allies and with insufficient am- 
munition for their cannon, resisted the invasion and overthrow of 
their country; with the dead so close together that I had to step 
over them in our hospitals to reach the living soldiers lying on 
straw; without any means of dressing wounds; with disease claim- 
ing thousands of victims — how could one hope for victory .^^ And 
yet I saw hope on every face. No man in authority throughout 
those terrible months ever within my hearing spoke of a separate 
peace, of capitulation or surrender. And our splendid old prime 
minister when asked to capitulate on terms so advantageous to 
Serbia that it would have seemed at that time wisdom to accept 
them, replied: "Better to die in glory than to live in shame." 

In the month of December, 1914, there happened a real miracle 
in Serbia, despite the fact that one-third of the country, and that 
the best of the farming and industrial region, had been invaded by 
the enemy. With one single railway line from Saloniki supplying 
its economic and military needs, the Serbian army manoeuvred 
its forces until the enemy was routed and driven from its country. 

For eight months longer Serbia maintained her own frontiers. 



An Eyewitness of the Serbian Apotheosis 55 

Austria being powerless until Germany and Bulgaria joined with 
her in a fresh attempt at invasion. This time they succeeded in 
cutting the railway line, encircled our forces, and compelled a 
general retreat to the Adriatic coast. 

For three months, October, November and December, 1915, 
we tramped over those terrible mountains of Albania without 
food, without shelter, leaving thousands of dead by the roadside. 
Day by day I watched the faces of the Serbian statesmen, officers, 
and soldiers who escorted the diplomatic caravans, in one of 
which I had been placed. With that curiosity of the American 
intelligence to probe the very essence of other people's souls I 
eavesdropped at their minds to know what they were thinking 
now that their country was invaded, their army forced to retreat, 
their women and children given over to martyrdom, and all that 
the army had accomplished in 1912 and 1913 lost by retreat. 
We were retracing the steps of the victorious army of 1912 — ■ 
retracing them as a defeated army. Where were their hopes of 
union now.'' The answer was, "We are bound for Saloniki to 
join our allies and fight for the freedom of Serbia and of Yugo- 
slavia." 

With their people scattered, their government living in a bor- 
rowed Greek island, it seemed futile to speak of Serbia as a nation. 
They were reduced to just a little group of men depending upon 
their allies for money to pay their army, to feed their prisoners of 
war, and the few thousands of their own people in exile all depend- 
ent upon the charity of the allied nations, including America, 
which, although not as yet an ally had shown its sympathy and 
charity. Inside the country the women and children wept under 
the martyrdom meted out to a conquered people. They were 
tortured by the Bulgarians, and oppressed in every conceivable 
way by the Austro-Hungarians, and yet the army and govern- 
ment dreamed and worked for the deliverance, not only of Serbia 
but of the whole Yugo-Slav nation. The prisoners in German 
camps, the martyrs under the Bulgarian lash dreamed of Yugo- 
Slav freedom. 

While America played a glorious and noble part in that deliver- 
ance, the action on the Western front was, of course, the event 
that permitted the attack on the South. Was it not the will of 
Divine Justice, as well as by consent of the great allied com- 



56 The Annals of the American Academy 

mander to whom we all owe so much, that the Serbian army, a 
few thousands of men, the remnant of the nation, should aim the 
first decisive blow of allied victory? The advance of the Serbian 
troops over mountains so high that only eagles or aeroplanes 
could be supposed to cross them struck the final blow for Yugo- 
slav liberty, and the blow struck in the Macedonian mountains 
resounded to the extreme limits of Yugo-Slavia. "Where are you 
going?" asked a general of the French army of a Serbian wounded 
soldier whom he met on the road bleeding from a wound in the 
head. "That's not the way to the hospital." "I am not going 
to the hospital^ — I am going to Serbia and beyond that — I am 
going home to free Bosnia!" Within a month the face of every 
soldier of the Yugo-Slav forces was set towards home and the 
fight still to come for the liberation of the Slav provinces of Aus- 
tria. There were men from Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia, and Her- 
zegovina as well as from Serbia fighting in that army — citizens all 
of a united kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, the 
national trinity of the Southern Slav race. 

They found their country in a terrible condition. There were 
no roads; the population which ciame out to meet them was in 
rags; there was no fire; roofs had been taken off of the houses, 
floors had been torn up, even windowsills and doorsills had been 
burned by the enemy. The trees had been cut down in their 
cemeteries; and in certain sections in an effort to prove that the 
population was other than Serbian, the very names had been 
erased from the tombstones. But what did it matter? That for 
which the Slav peoples had toiled and died throughout a thousand 
years of conscious history had been accomplished — their complete 
freedom and union. I, an adopted daughter, have lived this 
Gethsemane of a people — this apotheosis of a nation — as a Serbian 
woman; my heart beating with the wonder and the glory of the 
sacrifice. 

Now that this great inspiring gift of freedom and union has 
come to my adopted people, if we in Yugo-Slavia may look forward 
to a century of union and development of our material, ethical, 
and moral forces, and to the assimilation of whatever foreign ele- 
ments there may be within our borders, the decisions of our peoples 
to rule themselves cannot but aid to promote the peace of the 
world. The rights of self-determination cannot apply to a single 



An Eyewitness of the Serbian Apotheosis 57 

town, or one side of a street; certain minorities must remain even 
after the wisest alignment of froiitiers. Unhappily one cannot ask 
for the freedom of all the Yugo-Slavs: there are Serbs, Croats 
and Slovenes who must be content with other citizenship, although 
they have racial rights to be a part of this wonderful Yugo-Slavia. 

The broad lines of the Slav nationality with its open-minded 
religious tolerance offers guarantees to religioufe liberty: the 
Orthodox faith under the Patriarch of Constantinople is very like 
that of our own Episcopal Church. Among the Catholics of 
Croatia and Slovenia there exists a feeling of brotherhood towards 
the other religions of their nationality, as shown by the fact that 
many dignitaries of the Catholic Church in those states helped 
loyally to lead the movement for freedom. In no country in the 
world does the Jew have greater opportunity and honor than he 
has in Serbia and than he will have in the whole of the new Yugo- 
slav kingdom if he proves himself as good a citizen there as he is 
in Serbia. For the Turk I have seen proofs of tolerance in the 
efforts to preserve Mosques, and Moslem schools, ordered by our 
Crown Prince. After the war of 1912 every assistance was given 
to Turkish women from Macedonia who wanted to go to Turkey 
to look for their husbands if living or for their bodies if dead. 

In my travels about Macedonia I have remarked the just treat- 
ment of the Serbian authorities towards the other nationalities, 
Greeks, Turks, Albanians, and Bulgars, and have discussed with 
them the fact that it is perfectly possible for people of different 
strains of blood to live together under the same flag and same 
government, if equal rights of citizenship are accorded to all their 
citizens. I believe firmly that we, the Slavs — if aided by America 
in this difficult hour of our transition when we suffer physically 
and mentally from the ravages of war — will be able to construct 
quickly a United States of the Balkans, and that before many 
years we may yet hold that Educational Peace Conference at 
Vienna which was interrupted by the Austrian ultimatum. 



An Experiment in Progressive Government 

The Czechoslovak Republic 

By Hon. Charles Pergler 

Commissioner of the Czechoslovak Republic in the United States 

T N the Declaration of Independence of the Czechoslovak Repub- 
"'■ lie by its then provisional government, issued on October 
18, 1918, we find the following statements: 

Our democracy shall rest on universal suffrage. Women shall be placed on 
equal footing with men politically, socially and culturally. The rights of the 
minority shall be safeguarded by proportional representation; national minorities 
shall enjoy equal rights. The government shall be parliamentary in form and 
shall recognize the principles of the initiative and referendum. The standing army 

will be replaced by militia The Czechoslovak Nation will carry 

out far-reaching social and economic reforms; the large estates will be redeemed 

for home colonization; patents of nobility will be abolished Our 

nation will assume its part of the Austro-Hungarian pre-war public debt; the 
debts for this war we leave to those who incurred them. ... In its foreign 
policy the Czechoslovak Nation will accept its full share of responsibility in the 
reorganization of eastern Europe. It accepts fully the democratic and social 
principle of nationalism and subscribes to the doctrine that all covenants and 
treaties shall be entered into openly and frankly without secret diplomacy. 
. . . . Our constitution shall provide an efficient, rational and just govern- 
ment, which will exclude all special privileges and prohibit class legislation. 

This quotation is in itself a program, and at the same time it 
succinctly states the problems and tasks with which the new 
Czechoslovak Republic is confronted. These problems are not 
dissimilar to those found in the other new states formed as a result 
of the defeat of the Central Empires : Poland and Jugo-Slavia, as 
well as in united Rumania. In approaching these questions the 
American public must remember that the situation in Europe 
differs fundamentally from that prevailing in America. One can 
defend very plausibly the individualistic school of political 
economy, and equally so — if not with even more plausibility — 
what may properly be called the cooperative school of thought. 
But the most beautiful theories frequently collide with hard facts, 
and it is hard facts with which European statesmen must deal. 
T'hey must satisfy, first of all, the demand of their peoples for 

58 



kii Experiment in Progressive (government 59 

decent livelihood. It is only too obvious that to permit matters 
to drift as the extreme individualist so frequently demands would 
be worse than suicidal. When we think of the density of popula- 
tion in western and mid-Europe, and the comparative sparsity 
of population in the United States, we realize in a moment how 
fundamentally the situation differs, and how fundamentally 
different the approach to solution of social questions and problems 
of social reform inevitably must be. 

An indication of how thoroughly democratic the new Republic 
is, is found in the fact that one of the very first acts of the National 
Assembly was the abolition of all patents of nobility- Thus the 
new nation, through its duly authorized representatives, with one 
stroke gave earnest of its intention to do away with everything 
savoring of medievalism. 

The Land Question 
Of the economic and social problems one of the most important 
confronting the new state was that of the large landed estates. 
You will remember that hesitation to deal with this question was 
perhaps the fundamental reason why the Russian provisional 
government was wrecked, and why bolshevism gained the upper 
hand. Czechoslovak statesmen do not propose to be caught 
unawares in this fashion. The estates in most cases are those held 
by alien nobility and the late imperial house. More often than 
not they came into the hands of these various clans during the 
carpet-bagging period of the Thirty Years War, when Bohemia 
was plundered right and left by the Hapsburgs and their retainers. 
On April 16th the National Assembly adopted a law expropriating 
all large estates exceeding 150 hectares^ of land under cultivation, 
or that can be cultivated, and 100 hectares of woodland. Under 
this law the state will take over 1,300,000 hectares of cultivated 
land, and 3,000,000 hectares of woodland, which will furnish liveli- 
hood to 430,000 families. In the case of estates of the imperial 
family, estates illegally acquired, and estates of persons who dur- 
ing the war had been guilty of treason against the Czechoslovak 
nation, no compensation will be paid. There will be compensa- 
tion to all those who have not legally forfeited their right to it, 
or whose possession was not based upon robbery, theft or fraud. 

* A hectare is a measure of area containing ten thousand square metres, or 
2.471 acres. 



60 The Annals of the American Academy 

The Labor Question 

Immediately following the abolition of all patents of nobility 
and the making private citizens of various princes, dukes and 
counts, the National Assembly passed a law establishing the eight- 
hour day. According to latest advices, the National Assembly 
is about to pass legislation aimed at doing away with unemploy- 
ment and, in so far as this may not be possible, to alleviate the 
condition of the unemployed. No doubt ultimately this legis- 
lation will include some sort of a scheme of insurance against 
unemployment, against sickness and accident, and similar fea- 
tures of what is known in Europe as social legislation. The 
establishment of workingmen's chambers is being contemplated. 
This should not be confused with soviet institutions. In Europe 
chambers of commerce and similar institutions have a legal status, 
and logically, if there can be chambers of commerce, there is no 
reason why there should not be workingmen's chambers, which 
will be the legally authorized representatives and spokesmen of 
the workingmen, even as the chambers of commerce speak for the 
manufacturer and the merchant. In the meantime, the govern- 
ment is undertaking emergency public works to reduce the num- 
ber of unemployed and it has appropriated millions of crowns for 
these works, particularly in the City of Prague. 

Radical as certain features of this legislation may appear to some 
Americans, considering European standards and the advanced 
standing of the labor movement in particular, as well as its tre- 
mendous influence, it is simply what the times call for, if violent 
upheavals are to be avoided. After all, we must remember that 
the laws of social development were not suspended on the day 
we were born, and that history is also a record of transition from 
one order to another. The problem for the statesman and the 
sound thinker is to seek an orderly way, one which can be pur- 
sued with the minimum of suffering to society as a whole, and to 
the individuals composing it. The art of real statesmanship may 
be said to consist in bringing about new social formations without 
violence and without bloodshed. This, so far, the Czechoslovak 
Republic has accomplished. It seems to have taken a leaf out of 
the book of Anglo-Saxon history, as exemplified both in Great 
Britain and the United States, the most marked feature of which 
is the fact that in most cases fundamental changes in government 
and society were accompHshed peacefully. 



An Experiment in Progressive Government 61 

Certainly the methods adopted by the Czechoslovaks are 
diametrically opposed to bolshevism. The latter, if it has come 
to stand for anything, means revolutionary changes by violence, 
by civil war. It stands for the dictatorship of the proletariat, 
and for the soviet system of government. There is not a trace 
of that in the measures I have enumerated. On the contrary, 
everything is being done in an orderly and legal way; by the 
parliamentary methods so well known to western democracies 
and to the United States. 

The Army 
Czechoslovak statesmen will be careful to prevent anything 
resembling militarism from striking roots in the Republic. The 
Czechoslovak army still standing in Siberia is very democratic, 
as is inevitable from its origin, having been organized voluntarily 
by the men themselves for the purpose of fighting for the inde- 
pendence of their native land, and against German, Magyar and 
Prussian militarism. President Masaryk himself is squarely 
opposed to militarism which means rule by an army clique, and the 
subordination of civic ideals to those of the military martinet. 
In a recent public speech in Prague, the President declared that 
the new nation must have a democratic army based upon free and 
voluntary discipline and convinced of its mission to defend the 
country against external enemies. This democratic army will be 
solely for purposes of defense. Naturally it will be governed by 
the exigencies of the international situation, and by the fact 
whether or not an international organization can be achieved 
which will do away entirely with the necessity of any armies 
except for purely police purposes. 

Woman Suffrage 
Woman suffrage is already an accomplished fact in the Repub- 
lic. Even now eight members of the National Assembly are 
women, among them Dr. Alice Masaryk, daughter of the presi- 
dent, well known in America. During the war, she was held by 
the Austrian authorities in jail for a period of nine months. 

Presidential Powers 
Under European constitutional practice the power of the 
president is usually meagre indeed. It seems likely, however, 



62 The Annals oi' the American Academy 

that the Czechoslovak state will somewhat follow American 
examples. Thus, in accordance with a recent recommendation 
of the Constitutional Committee of the National Assembly, the 
president shall have the right to name and dismiss cabinet minis- 
ters, negotiate and ratify international agreements and treaties; 
shall be present and preside at the meetings of the Council of 
Ministers, having also the right to make recommendations to the 
National Assembly in matters of state. This does not mean that 
parliamentary control will be done away with, and that the 
president will have anything like autocratic powers. But it does 
mean that he is to possess a larger freedom of movement and 
more initiative than a European president usually has. 

German Population 

In mid-Europe no state can be created without certain national 
minorities, and this is a troublesome problem indeed. There is 
going to be in the Czechoslovak Republic a minority of Germans, 
not nearly so large as the Germans themselves claim, but still a 
minority. This fact entitles us to all the sympathy the world 
can give us, especially when we bear in mind that this is a German 
minority. This minority is entitled to fair treatment. The 
Czechoslovak delegation at the Peace Conference, in outlining 
our claims, declared that the New republic will guarantee to 
national minorities full freedom of development and cultivation 
of racial individuality. Dr. Charles Kramar, the Prime Minister 
of the Czechoslovak Republic, in a speech delivered to the Na- 
tional Assembly in Prague on December 20th, 1918, said that 
complete cultural, social and economic freedom will be granted to 
Bohemian Germans. Dr. Kramar said: 

We do not want to be oppressors. We do not want to follow the former 
German policy in Austria, as we have seen what it leads to. The Ger- 
mans in Bohemia, with their great economic strength, are shrewd enough 
calculators not to have any particular desire to be incorporated into Germany. 
For the Czechoslovak Republic the whole world is open. Germany, on the 
contrary, will be in the worse imaginable position. Even if there were no direct 
economic boycott, the indirect moral boycott will be far more terrible. 

The Czech Social Democrats of Bohemia are certainly not 
jingoes, and their chief organ, the Pravo Lidu, on December 7, 
1918, in writing on the question of the German minority, said: 



An Experiment in Progressive Government 63 

The present German possession in Bohemia is not the result of natural devel- 
opment, but of terror and oppression. In the natural development and a free 
course, the German possessions in the north of Bohemia would assume quite 
another aspect. In spite of the terror and oppression and so-called assimilation, 
we can prove that German Bohemia does not exist, as this territory is everywhere 
mixed with the Czech population, which in many places forms, as a matter of fact, 
majorities. According to reliable estimates, there were in 1910 in thie district 
of Most, in northern Bohemia, which the Germans claim, over 40,000 Czechs; 
in Litvinow, over 30,000; in Duchov, over 35,000; in Bilinia, about 30,000; in 
TepKce over 20,000, etc. Since 1910 the development was in favor of the 
Czechs, so that it may be safely assumed that in many places the Czech minori- 
ties have now become majorities. 

As regards the attitude of the Germans in Bohemia themselves, 
it is interesting to quote the German paper Prager Tagblatt of 
December 23, 1918: 

Masaryk claims the integrity of Bohemia, but he wants to assure the German 
minorities not only equal rights, but also full rights of nationalities. This is a 
new idea. If a really democratic autonomy is introduced, we shall have no 
reason to complain. 

The National Policy 

In any event, because the Germans and Magyars oppressed 
the Czechoslovaks, it does not follow that the latter will oppress 
the former. It is a significant fact that during the whole of the 
nineteenth century not a single Czech statesman appeared who in 
any way advocated the oppression of other peoples. On the con- 
trary the Czechs always emphasized the fact that they would 
accord their German citizens complete civil rights which, of course, 
includes cultural rights. It was the great Czech historian and 
statesman, Palacky, who said that we never had, nor ever shall 
have the intention of oppressing other people; that, true to our 
character, rejecting all desire for the revenge of past wrongs, we 
extend our right hand to all our neighbors who are prepared to 
recognize the equality of all nations without regard to their size 
or political power. And it was Havlicek, the Czech leader in 
1848, who said that oppression never brings good results, and in 
time brings vengeance upon the heads of its own originators. 

The new Czechoslovak Republic is the greatest experiment 
in really liberal and progressive government ever undertaken on 
the European Continent, and it is entitled to the sympathy and 
aid of the great American democracy. 



Reconstruction Among the Small Nations of 
Middle Europe 

By Stephen P. Duggan, Ph.D. 

College of the City of New York 

^X^HE French Revolution gave birth to two political principles — • 
-*■ the principle of nationality and the principle of democracy. 
As long as the French revolutionary armies remained true 
to those two political principles, wherever they went throughout 
Europe they were received with acclaim and enthusiasm, but 
when they repudiated those two political principles they were 
rejected by the peoples of Europe. They did repudiate them 
when the Revolution fell under the control of Napoleon Bona- 
parte, and from a democratic revolution it was transformed into 
an autocratic imperialism. Bonaparte was destroyed because 
the peoples of Europe insisted upon the validity of the very prin- 
ciple to which the French Revolution had given birth, namely, 
the principle of nationality. It was the aroused national spirit 
of Spain, Germany, Russia and England that overthrew the 
greatest military autocrat of his day. 

The Congress of Vienna 

When the Congress of Vienna was held in 1815, one would have 
supposed that the statesmen and the kings, who had assembled 
there and who had called upon their peoples to rise against the 
foreign usurper, would have remembered the strength of the 
revolutionary principle and would have made their territorial 
readjustments conform to it. Unfortunately they did not. At 
that Congress two political principles fought for supremacy — the 
dynastic and the nationalistic — and the dynastic won out in 
every conflict. The territorial readjustments made then were 
made without any consideration of the principle of nationality. 
Peoples that were opposed to each other were united in one state, 
and peoples that formed one nation were divided among several 
states. The Dutch, who were Teutonic in origin, Protestant in 
religion and commercial in their economy, were compelled to form 
a single state with the Belgians who were Romance in race, Catho- 



Reconstruction Among the Small Nations 65 

lie in faith and agrarian in their economy. In other words, two 
peoples that disliked each other were compelled to live in one state. 
On the other hand, Poles and Italians forming one nation were 
divided among several states. The result was that the history of 
Europe from the treaty of Vienna down to the present day has 
been the story of attempts on the part of the various peoples and 
nationalities to tear up that treaty and any other treaty that 
has since been made which did not conform to the principle of 
nationality. 

The Congress of Berlin 

In Western Europe by 1870 that principle had won out every- 
where, and Western Europe, thereafter, was made up of national 
states. But although Western Europe by 1870 had realized the 
principle of nationality, that was not true of Eastern Europe. It 
would seem as if statesmen would never learn by experience. 
The Congress of Berlin of 1878, which assembled to readjust 
Eastern Europe after the Russo-Turkish war, paid as little atten- 
tion and as little respect to the principle of nationality as those 
who had assembled at Vienna in 1815. No statesman had ever 
less reason to return to his capital and to speak of having brought 
back "peace with honor" than Disraeli, because few treaties of 
peace were more dishonorable than the peace of Berlin of 1878. 
The principle of nationality was violated in every respect. Bosnia 
and Herzegovina, inhabited exclusively by Serbs, was given over 
to Austria; Bessarabia, largely inhabited by Roumanians, was 
torn from Roumania and given to Russia; and Macedonia, inhab- 
ited by Bulgars, Serbs and Greeks, was given back to the mercy 
of the Turk. The result has been that since 1878 the determina- 
tion of the peoples of Eastern and Southeastern Europe has been 
to tear up that treaty and to attempt to do what had been done 
in Western Europe — realize the principle of nationality. The 
first principle, therefore, upon which the reconstruction of Middle 
Europe must rest is that nationality must be the basis of terri- 
torial readjustment. It must be recognized that if on any great 
scale the people of one nation are placed within the borders of 
another nation, they will never rest content as long as there is a 
chance to break the peace and attain to national unity. 



66 The Annals of the American Academy 

The Evolution of Small States 

You read in your history books that poKtical evolution has been 
towards the formation of big states. That is not true. During 
the past century two great states of Europe have attained national 
unity — Germany and Italy. But, on the other hand, during that 
same period Belgium gained its independence in 1815, as did 
Serbia about the same time. Furthermore, in 1829 Greece 
became independent, followed, in 1856, by Roumania, and in 1878 
by Bulgaria. Finally, in 1905, Norway, that had been united 
to Sweden by the treaty of Vienna, declared its independence. 
Now we have another group of small nations that have arisen 
in Central Europe — Finland, Poland, Czechoslovakia. Political 
evolution has been really towards the development and the con- 
stitution of small nations, not large nations. 

In 1914, Europe was organized politically as follows: In West- 
ern Europe there was a series of uni-national states, states made 
up of one nation. England, Spain, France, Germany, and Italy, 
are all one-nation states. Eastern Europe on the contrary was 
made up entirely of one great pluri-nation — the Russian Empire, 
including within its borders many nations. Right down through 
Middle Europe from Cape North in Lapland to Cape Mattapan at 
the end of Greece was a series of small nations and suppressed 
nationalities — Swedes, Norwegians, Danes, Finns, Poles, Bohe- 
mians, Hungarians, Serbs, Greeks and Bulgars. This Middle 
Europe, made up of these small nations, became the danger zone 
of Europe. 

There are two reasons why this situation in Middle Europe 
endangered the peace of the world. 

Suppression of the Principle of Nationality 

First because everywhere throughout that region the principle 
of nationality was violated. Poles and Finns in Russia were 
allowed no national rights and few rights of citizens. Poles in 
Germany were not privileged to speak their language in public; 
their newspapers were suppressed; they were not allowed to send 
their children to school where Polish was taught; they were not 
allowed to attend church where the service was in Polish; they 
were not allowed to form Polish unions to study Polish culture. 
All this was partly or wholly true of the Czechs in Austria, the 



Reconstruction Among the Small Nations 67 

Slovaks in Hungary, and, of course, still more true of the sup- 
pressed peoples of the Ottoman Empire. Not only were there 
suppressed nationalities throughout Middle Europe, but nowhere 
did nationalities correspond with territorial boundaries. There 
were more Serbs outside of Serbia than inside of Serbia, and the 
Serbs outside of Serbia wanted to be inside of Serbia, and the 
Serbs inside of Serbia wanted them . Under the existing conditions 
they could not realize their nationality, but they were detfermined 
that sometime they would do so. That was the condition of 
unstable political equilibrium throughout the whole of Middle 
Europe. It was an invitation to war. Arbitration would not 
have settled it. You cannot arbitrate a condition where part of a 
nation outside of its boundaries want to be inside of them. The 
only settlement is to let them go inside. 

Aggression by the Big Nations 

The second reason why Middle Europe was the danger zone of 
Europe was that the very weakness of these small nations was an 
invitation to -aggression. When the war broke out Sweden was 
pro-German. Why.^^ Because she lived in fear and terror of 
Russia. Denmark was anti-German because she lived in fear 
and terror of Germany. Little Serbia was land-locked and with- 
out access to the sea and had practically but one market, Austria- 
Hungary. Austria-Hungary attempted to bring her to her knees 
over and over again by strangling her economically, by raising 
tariff duties on her products to such an extent that she would 
starve. The very weakness of these little nations was an invi- 
tation to aggression on the part of the big nations. 

Protection of the Small Nations 

What is the second principle, therefore, for a sound reconstitu- 
tion of Europe and of the world .^^ It is to understand that in the 
new world reorganization or even in the new European reorgani- 
zation, the majority of nations are going to be small nations and 
must be protected in their rights and in their needs. Now what 
are their rights and their needs? It would take a long time to go 
into a thorough discussion of them, but there are a few that are 
self-evident. Some of these nations of Middle Europe, like 
Czechoslovakia and Poland and Hungary are absolutely land- 



68 The Annals of the American Academy 

locked. They have no seacoast. They have no access to the 
sea, and in this industrial era if there is not free access to the sea 
for a state it means the death of that state. How are they to get 
it.f* They cannot get it by their own might. Czechoslovakia, to 
take an illustration, is an industrial nation. It has made remark- 
able advances in the last generation industrially. It paid much 
beyond its proportionate share of the taxes of Austria before the 
war. It will starve if it cannot get the raw materials from beyond 
the seas that are necessary for its industries. Any nation will 
starve under those conditions. The electrical industries today 
contribute enormously to our necessities and conveniences and 
comforts. Electrical industries are dependent particularly upon 
two raw materials, rubber and copper. Rubber is localized in 
Central Africa and Central South America. Copper is localized 
in only a few places in the world and none in Czechoslovakia. If 
she is to continue her industrial life she must have the opportunity 
to bring freely from over the seas raw materials, and she must 
have free access to the coast to send her products across the seas 
to other countries. She must have the right to send those goods 
to the seaboard over railroads going through other countries, 
with the knowledge that she will not be charged preferential 
freight rates or be interfered with by tariff duties of any kind. 
Not only must these land-locked states of Middle Europe have 
access to the sea, but they must have the free use of ports. Any- 
one who is familiar with the port rules knows how easy it is to put 
obstacles in the way of ships that are loading and unloading — to 
give preferences to the ships of one state over another. At 
Danzig, which is the outlet for Poland, and at Fiume, which is the 
outlet for the Jugoslavs, the Magyars and the Bohemians, there 
must exist what was agreed to at the end of the second Balkan 
War in regard to Saloniki. There part of the port itself was given 
over to the Serbs so that they could have their own docks and 
warehouses and also a spur of the railroad going down to those 
docks and warehouses. Their products then could be loaded 
upon the ships coming from abroad at those docks without inter- 
ference on the part of any other people. 

There are other needs of these people which I cannot take up 
now. I shall just touch on the third principle that is at the basis 
of a sound reconstruction of Middle Europe, namely, the political 



Reconstruction Among the Small Nations 69 

principle of confederation. During the war the three Scandi- 
navian countries, Norway, Sweden and Denmark, formed an 
informal kind of confederation which will probably continue for 
some time. If with that Scandinavian confederation in the North 
there were a Danubian confederation to the South there would 
probably be a greater feeling of security in Central Europe. If 
there were added to this a Balkan confederation reconstituted to 
be what it was in 1912, the prospects for continued peace in 
Southeastern Europe would be very much brighter than they 
ever have been in the past, and there is very little reason why 
this should not take place. Once the boundary lines are settled 
at Paris, and this abnormal period of turmoil and national resent- 
ment is over, in all probability, the peoples of the Balkans will 
settle down to the normal life that existed before the great war. 
The need of mutual help in the form of unions for tariff and other 
economic purposes will make itself so felt that in all probability a 
political confederation will follow. 

The League of Nations 

Nevertheless, although so much benefit would accrue to Middle 
Europe by the principle of confederation being realized, I do not 
believe that we can expect peace and stability and security to 
exist there without a greater confederation being formed — the 
League of Nations. The great states, the great powers, have been 
able always to command respect for their rights in the past. They 
have insisted upon them as inherent in their moral personality. 
Just as in municipal life, a man is equal before the law because 
he is a man, without reference to his being wealthy or intelli- 
gent, poor or ignorant, so today we shall expect under a league 
of nations that all nations, the little as well as the great, will 
have their moral personality observed. The realization of 
greater international cooperation is the only hope for the little 
nations, the small peoples, not only of Middle Europe, but of 
the earth. 



A Danubian Confederation of the Future 

By V. R. Savic 

Former Head of the Press Bureau in the Serbian Foreign OflBce; Author of 

South Eastern Europe 

\\TAR has always strongly impressed the imagination of man. 
" ' It has inspired poets, seers and thinkers. But of all 
inspirations by the war, the most appealing to me are those that 
are a negation of the war, — thus, in the final inspiration in the 
Mahabarata, the great Indian war poem, when the old King 
Dritirastra in a vision saw all the warriors that fell on the fatal 
battlefield of Kukureshtra rising from the Ganges, friends and 
foes reconciled, all resplendent in youth and glory. 

Technically we are still at war and all men of good-will are 
thinking how to get out of war, how to make peace, not a tem- 
porary one, but a lasting peace based upon solid foundation. 

Two great aggressive empires, Russia and Austria-Hungary, 
have passed away and upon their ruins, new states have sprung 
up, full of life, with new interests and a new outlook. The Bal- 
kans, that is what the politicians used to call the Balkans, have 
disappeared also. Only Bulgaria will remain a purely Balkan 
state. All other Balkan nations will have their future interests 
mainly outside the confines of the Balkan peninsula. Greece 
will extend to Asia Minor and look for the penetration of those 
vast territories which for some time were the dependencies of 
Helenic civilization and later on were the stronghold of Byzan- 
tium. Serbia and Montenegro have ceased as independent states 
and have merged themselves into a larger national commonwealth 
of Jugoslavia, now officially called the kingdom of the Serbs, 
Croats and Slovenes. With its territories on the left banks of the 
Rivers Save and Danube, that kingdom has extended beyond the 
Balkan peninsula, and, with its Alpine provinces, it belongs now 
to central Europe. Rumania also has altogether ceased to be a 
Balkan state, having annexed Bessarabia and Transylvania. 
Constantinople and the Straits surely will pass under an inter- 
national control, and Albania will be tutored by a power or a 
league of powers from outside the Balkans. Moreover, the former 

70 



A Danubian Confederation of the Future 71 

Balkan states, Rumania and Serbia, having nothing more to fear 
from Austria-Hungary, will turn to the north where instead of 
enemies they will find friends and natural allies in Czecho-Slovakia 
and Magyaria, the Magyar national state. Both these states, 
like Rumania and Serbia, must be creations of the Peace Con- 
ference at Versailles. 

Since men or nations cannot be treated independently from 
their environments, it is necessary to draw attention to one strong 
feature of those countries. The fact should be emphasized that 
the Balkan peninsula, unlike the two other great European penin- 
sulas, the Apenine and the Pyrenean, is not a geographical entity 
separated from the rest of the continent by a high and well 
marked chain of mountains. The Balkans are geographically 
an integral part of central Europe. The greatest European river, 
the Danube, is a common life-artery for all those countries. 
All the Bosnian and Serbian valleys open to the north and 
central Europe. This geographical fact may serve as an addi- 
tional explanation of the causes of the present war and as a sug- 
gestion of what ought to be a sound policy of the new states of 
that part of Europe. 

At the present moment the dominating desire of all those peoples 
is the achievement of complete national independence. The 
nations of southeastern Europe are longing for freedom, as free- 
dom has been so long denied to them. Without the satisfaction 
of that demand no step forward can be made in the reconstruction 
of that stormy corner of Europe. We assume here that that de- 
mand will be fully satisfied, as Czecho-Slovakia and Jugoslavia 
base their aspirations upon victory achieved as well as upon the 
fourteen points of President Wilson. 

There are many reasons, historic, national and economic which 
prompt the Czecho-Slovaks, the Jugoslavs and the Rumanians to 
remain good allies in the future and work out a scheme for close 
cooperation. The Jugoslavs and the Rumanians have lived as 
neighbors for more than a thousand years, but their history has 
never chronicled a conflict between them. They had the same 
sources of civilization, the Greek Christianity; they had the same 
enemies, the Bulgars, Magyars and the Turks. They shared the 
same destiny, being for centuries under the Turkish yoke, and 
were suffering from Magyar oligarchy. Together they shook off 



72 The Annals of the American Academy 

Turkish rule and together in a world conflict they have now 
achieved the freedom and the unity of their race. All their past 
and present points to their mutual understanding in the future, 
as their interests nowhere clash. 

The same is true of the Czecho-Slovaks. They and the Jugo- 
slavs are of the same Slavic origin. Their languages even today 
represent a strong bond of unity. The Slovak dialect of the 
Czech tongue is so near to the Serbo-Croatian language that 
there is a dispute among the scientists whether the Slovak idiom 
should be classified into the group of the Jugoslav or into that of 
the Western Slav languages, to which belong the Czech, the Polish 
and certain other idioms. They also have drawn upon the same 
sources of civilization. In the tenth century the Slav apostles, 
Cyril and Methodius, translated the Gospels from the Greek into 
the Jugoslav language as was spoken in Macedonia. They went 
preaching the Gospel and strengthening Christianity among the 
Bulgarians, Jugoslavs and Czecho-Slovaks. Therefore, they are 
equally venerated by each one of those peoples. By the invasion 
of the Magyars, in the ninth century, the Czecho-Slovaks and 
Jugoslavs became separated territorially. Nevertheless, the bond 
of friendship and cultural ties never ceased to exist between them. 

The similarity of their history is so great that one is rather 
tempted to look at it as a history of one and the same nation, 
forcibly separated into two physical parts, but whose inner life 
by a miracle remained the same. The Magyars subjugated the 
Slovaks in the north as well as the Croats in the south, whereas 
Bohemia and Serbia, as the main parts of their respective nations 
continued their independence and attained a remarkable degree 
of prosperity and civilization in the Middle Ages. The Turkish 
invasion worked upon them very similarly. After a prolonged 
struggle, Serbia succumbed to the Turks. Bohemia, fearing Turk- 
ish menace, in order to avoid the fate of Serbia, allied herself with 
Austria. But the result proved the same. The bad faith of the 
German dynasty of Hapsburg was an evil equal to the sword of 
Janissaries. Bohemia lost her independence and during long 
centuries, like Serbia, sank into misery and oblivion. 

But there was a fire smouldering beneath the ashes. In the 
nineteenth century, after the great commotion created by the 
French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, the national life of 



A Danubian Confederation of the Future 73 

both the Jugoslavs and Czecho-Slovaks was revived in Kterature 
and at the same time the nucleus of the present Jugoslavia was 
created in an autonomous Serbia out of the Turkish Vilayet of 
Belgrade. Since that time they both have progressed apace and 
in the same lines. The Czechs helped every national movement 
among the Jugoslavs and the latter always sided with the Czechs 
in their common struggle against the Germans and the Magyars. 
When, in 1848, the Germans of Bohemia took part in the Pan- 
German Congress at Frankfort, the Czechs proclaimed the soli- 
darity of the Slavs by summoning a Pan-Slav Congress at Prague 
where the centuries old friendship between the Czecho-Slavs and 
Jugoslavs was strongly manifested and fortified by new coopera- 
tion. When in 1866 Austria became Austria-Hungary, the 
Czecho-Slovaks and the Jugoslavs met one and the same fate. 
To them were denied the rights of ancient, independent states. 
Both of them were cunningly divided in Austria and Hungary and 
their national resources were recklessly exploited for the promo- 
tion of schemes directly opposed to their national welfare. The 
last war was a culmination of long endured iniquities. Their 
masters exacted from them the heaviest sacrifices in order to 
make their chains stronger. Both of them, the Czecho-Slovaks 
and the Jugoslavs, were compelled to fight German battles. They 
both resisted that plan admirably. There has been no written 
treaty of alliance between them, but it is difficult to find any other 
instance in history of a closer cooperation and a more perfect con- 
fidence between two nations. Their policy sprang up simul- 
taneously, dictated by the masses of the people whose heart felt 
instantaneously the whole meaning of the last world struggle. 
President T. Masaryk once said to me at London : 

My policy was clearly revealed to me by the action of the Czecho-Slovak 
soldiers who, without awaiting upon any concert of their leaders, surrendered to 
the Allies in Serbia and Russia and immediately formed their own regiments to 
fight the central Empires. The same was done by the Jugoslavs. We, their 
leaders, had nothing to do but to follow and explain that policy to the Allies. 

The same was done at home. Their recognized leaders were 
imprisoned, sentenced and executed by brutal masters. But in 
spite of everything their resistance grew and the mysterious coop- 
eration among their national masses became closer with every day 
as war dragged on. Their deputies in the Vienna Parliament 



74 The Annals of the American Academy 

proceeded with common accord. They denounced boldly the 
policy of the Central Empires. They preached and organized 
open revolt, which brought about the collapse of Austria-Hungary 
from within as much as it was due to the pressure from without. 
The Peace Conference will do justice to their bravery, and the 
brotherhood of arms between the Czecho-Slovaks and the Jugo- 
slavs will be consecrated by a solemn international action by 
which both will be admitted into the society of nations as free, 
independent members. 

They were true allies in the past; they are now; and they will 
continue to be in the future. There are ties stronger than any 
written treaty. The fear of a new German invasion by armed 
or by economic ways will dictate to them an agreement for the 
defense of their political and economic freedom. As in politics, 
so in economics they are mutually interdependent. Czecho- 
slovakia can hardly find a better market for her manufactured 
goods than Jugoslavia, The latter being an agricultural country 
will have in Czecho-Slovakia, the nearest customer for her raw 
products. The Czechs will be the first to be interested in the de- 
velopment of the great natural resources of Jugoslavia. 

With some difference of details, the same can be said for the 
past and future relations between Rumania and Czecho-Slovakia. 
Through the latter, Rumania and Jugoslavia can reach most 
easily northern and western Europe. Through Rumania, both 
of the others can be brought in contact with the rich countries on 
the shores of the Black Sea. Jugoslavia offers to Rumania and 
Czecho-Slovakia her fine Adriatic ports and Salonica which opens 
for them the wealth of the Indies and the East. As there was 
nothing dividing them in the past, so there is everything pointing 
to their cooperation in the future. 

But all three of them, Jugoslavia, Rumania and Czecho-Slo- 
vakia, will stumble over Magyaria. The Magyars are a deep 
wedge, and for centuries were a stumbling block for the coopera- 
tion of nations in that part of Europe. Like a whirlwind from 
Asia they overran Russia and the Carpathians and settled down 
on the fertile plains on the banks of the Danube and the Tissa. 
Being a military organized camp, like all Mongolian tribes, they 
conquered easily the rather meek Slavic tribes and pushed them 
north into the mountains and beyond large rivers in the south. 



A Danubian Confederation of the Future 75 

After a thousand years of their European home, the Magyars have 
kept very much of their fiery, ardent, self-assertive Asiatic char- 
acter. Through centuries the initial principle of their life — lust 
for conquest and sheer denial of any rights to their opponents — 
has manifested itself repeatedly. They conquered the Slavs, but 
they could never subdue them entirely. Weak as aggressors, the 
Slavs are very strong in their passive resistance. In the moun- 
tains, in the marshy plains, they kept their character and their 
faith, and after every apparent defeat, they came back stronger. 

The thousand years of their past history, culminating in the 
struggle just ended, should have brought home a great lesson to 
each of them. The Slavs ought to recognize frankly the fact 
that the Magyars cannot be dislodged from their position. The 
Magyars should give up the eternal game of dominating the 
Slavs. Let them meet on a basis of equality and confidence. 
Let them consider their future relations in the light of the great 
modern principle, that no nation can live in itself, for itself and 
by itself. The old principle of exclusion and competition is to be 
replaced by the new one of trust and cooperation. 

When the crust of old prejudices falls from their eyes, they will 
see how much of their past has been an awful misunderstanding, 
how, instead of irreconcilable ^antagonists, they are the most 
natural allies. The Magyars will see how their exclusiveness and 
self-assertion brought only misery to themselves and to their 
Slav neighbors. The Magyars' denial of Slav freedom under- 
mined the real basis of their own liberty. In order to subjugate 
Slavs, they became slaves themselves and the overseers of German 
slaves. They will remember that the brightest and greatest 
phase of Magyar history was the time of King Mathius Corvinus, 
a sincere friend and ally of the Slavs. Never since has Magyar 
national genius shone so brightly as when it was cooperating with 
its Slav neighbors. 

The Germans who invented and spread the teaching about an 
imaginary Slav danger, whilst preparing the conquest of the 
world for themselves, poured the poison into the Magyar ears that 
they were a super-race destined to rule. Of course the Germans 
gave them only the empty shell and kept the meat for themselves. 
What has been the result? The Magyar's professions of liberty 
degenerated into a cynic oppression of non-Magyar races and an 



76 The Annals of the American Academy 

uncontested rule of Magyar junkers over Magyar masses. The 
fertile plain of Alfold saw with every day an increase of emigra- 
tion of the Magyar peasantry overburdened by a medieval eco- 
nomic system and political corruption of the crudest form. The 
Magyar "super-race" after a very short and brilliant period of 
national literature and art during the struggle for independence 
of 1848, produced nothing that could win an international recog- 
nition. Their art and literature became a pale reflex of the 
cheap products of German mind of the last fifty years. Their 
only international "success" was the regilding of their aristocratic 
coat-of-arms by marriage with eccentric dollar princesses. Whereas 
the Magyar spiritual life sank to stale mediocrities, the oppressed 
Slavs exerted themselves vigorously in art, science and literature. 
The Czecho-Slovaks gave to the world a Dvorak, a Smetana, a 
Vrhlicki, a Masaryk. The power of the Jugoslav genius was re- 
vealed by the beauty of their national poetry and of their music 
and won the most honorable place in science through Tesla and 
Pupin, and in the plastic art through Mestrovic, now unanimously 
recognized as the leading sculptor of the world. 

If those people of southeastern Europe were to follow the teach- 
ings of Berlin, of Vienna or of Budapest they would in the good 
old way dismember Hungary and boast that this Mongolian 
dragon has been smashed and disposed of once and for all. And 
I should not say that such tendencies do not exist. The Balkan 
nations have for so long a time been tutored by Vienna and Buda- 
pest, that they cannot easily rid themselves of the ways of their 
former masters. But it would not be the Balkanization of the 
central Europe, it would be Vienneizing or Budapestizing it. 

Fifty years ago, Count Andrassy returned from the Congress of 
Berlin to Budapest where he was treated like a great conqueror 
and far-sighted statesman. In the Hungarian Parliament and the 
fashionable clubs of Budapest, before gentlemen with diamond 
studs in their white shirts, he said boastfully that he was able to 
obtain for Austria-Hungary, not only the occupation of Bosnia 
but also the military administration of the Sanjak of Novi- 
Bazar. "Thus gentlemen," Count Andrassy boasted, "the Slav 
hydra has been smashed, the union of Serbia and Montenegro has 
been prevented, and the Magyars control the road to Salonica." 

Life sometimes reserves strange surprises and revenges. The 



A Danubian Confederation of the Future 77 

would-be victorious Magyars were every day losing ground on 
that very field that only counts in the long run, the field of spiritual 
and moral achievements. Whereas the subjugated Slavs with 
every year made a new conquest on the way of true freedom and 
greatness. Thus the whole teaching of their history is giving 
them a serious warning on the threshold of a new era that is to 
dawn on Europe as a price of so much bravery and suffering. The 
sooner they bury the hatchet of past feuds the better for them- 
selves and humanity. In order to enter the new life of promises 
the Magyars must be cured of the ridiculous pretension of a 
super-race which happily never was the religion of Magyar masses. 
At the bottom of Magyaro-Slavs relations, in spite of German in- 
sinuations and fatal misunderstandings, there remained always a 
feeling of respect and admiration. The plastic, elusive, imagina- 
tive Slav soul was a match to the ardent, fiery, somehow sombre 
Magyar mind. Temperamentally, they complement each other 
and if fused in a happy partnership can produce great and lasting 
things. The Slavs believe in their mission, but that mission never 
was that which the Germans taught about the Pan-Slavism. 
The Slavs believe in reconciliation and not in opposition. Against 
the German ideal of violence and pride, they set up their ideal of 
love and Christian humility. It consists not in compelling other 
nations to accept their outlook on life, but in sympathy for other 
nations' ideals. 

The Slavs and the Magyars can enter the new life with old 
prejudices, petty jealousies, mean bickerings and eternal friction; 
or they can make their common life vaster, more beautiful and 
nobler through sincere reconciliation and cooperation. The 
Slavs do recognize the value of the Magyars ; they are a- desirable 
partner, but they must not be pressed into that partnership, they 
must be attracted. We may hope that the Magyars are ready 
for the change of attitude. The junkerism which heaped only 
misery and reproaches upon the Magyars is now defeated. Some 
of the Magyars could already see upon the Slav banners, the 
slogan "for our and your liberty." The Magyar democracy 
must feel friendly towards such instinctively democratic people 
as the Slavs. The self -evidence of so many common interests 
between them will do the rest. 

The Magyar government headed by Count Karolyi made a 



78 The Annals of the American Academy 

vain and very belated plea that the geographical frontiers of 
Hungary should be preserved, that the Magyars were ready to 
grant the complete national autonomy to Serbs, Slovaks and 
Rumanians comprised in those boundaries. The Peace Con- 
ference cannot and should not respond to it. This plea and 
offer are a survival of the old pre-war Magyar idealogy. The 
nationalities of Hungary already possess their autonomy of will, 
and intend to settle their political status according to their own 
interests and aspirations. The Magyars have nothing to grant 
them. The nations of southeastern Europe demand above 
everything freedom and unity. No economic, geographical or 
strategical considerations can stand in the way of that. The 
future cooperation of those nations can be attained only through 
freedom and in freedom. The Magyars must recognize and recon- 
cile themselves to these facts if they desire to enjoy the advan- 
tages of a cooperation. 

The most necessary and desirable factors for cooperation with 
the Magyars are at hand. Not one of those nations is powerful 
enough to menace the independence of another. Czecho-Slovakia 
with strong German minorities will number about twelve millions; 
Magyaria with strong German and other minorities about ten 
millions; Jugoslavia about twelve millions and Rumania about 
twelve millions. Not one of these countries is economically self- 
sufficient. But united in a loose political and a strong economic 
confederation, they will command natural resources greater than 
any other European country. Rumania possesses oil wells and 
salt mines, the richest in Europe. Jugoslavia has an abundance 
of coal, copper, iron, and together with Bohemia is one of the 
wealthiest mining countries of the world. Jugoslavia, as well as 
the Carpathian mountains, has an abundance of forests and their 
timber industries will come ne^^ to Russia. Rumanian, Magyar 
and Jugoslav plains are the richest granaries of Europe. The 
vineyards of Hungary and Jugoslavia are equal to the best 
French vineyards. Jugoslavia enjoys the finest climate for fruit 
growing and cattle raising; Hungary for horse breeding. Czecho- 
slovakia already possesses many industries. The skill and 
organizing capacities of the Czechs stand among the first in 
Europe. 

A Danubian confederation represented by such gifted nations 



A Danubian Confederation of the Future 79 

as Latins, Slavs and Magyars, could evolve a civilization whose 
brilliancy might easily surpass anything attained until now in 
Europe. Materially and geographically it could be envied by 
many other countries. In variety and beauty of its scenery, in the 
richness of its soil, in the extent of its frontiers for the increase of 
popiilation, in the navigability of its rivers, in the safety, size and 
beauty of its seaports — that confederation would be better 
provided than any other European country. Its geographical 
position which, heretofore, presented many disadvantages, such 
as being on a high road connecting East and West and open to all 
invasions and conquests, should in the new era of peace be turned 
to greatest advantage. 

The Danube in connecting all these countries offers not only 
the cheapest route for an internal exchange of goods, but opens to 
them the access to the rich countries around and beyond the 
Black Sea. The Adriatic ports give them the access to the civil- 
ized West. Moreover, nature has provided through the Balkans 
the nearest and easiest access to Salonica. That port, the largest 
and safest in the Mediterranean, is the key of the fabulous riches 
of the East. The iEgean Sea is connected now by a railway line 
with Prague, Budapest, Belgrade, Skoplje and Salonica, but 
could be reached also by a navigable water way which was under 
consideration before the last war. The Danube is navigable and 
so are many of its tributaries in Czecho-Slovakia, Hungary and 
Jugoslavia. But its navigation presents some difficulties at the 
Iron Gates and at Sulina. Those difficulties can, however, be 
avoided and the way to Salonica considerably shortened by a 
canal to be built from Smederevo in Serbia using the courses of 
the Morava and the Vardar rivers. Now there is no watershed 
between the Morava and the Vardar. The waters from a plateau 
near Kumanovo in Serbia run indifferently to the Danube or to 
the Vardar which empties in the Gulf of Salonica. The water way 
from Brunn in Bohemia or from Budapest or from Belgrade to 
Smyrna or to the Suez Canal or to any port of the Mediterranean 
can be made shorter by 600 nautical miles than the existing way 
along the Danube and through the Straits. The Hungarian gov- 
ernment before the war had under consideration a costly and 
difficult scheme to connect Fiume with the River Save by a canal. 
It would require costly boring of a mountain range which would be 



80 The Annals of the American Academy 

superfluous if the project of a cheaper canal to Salonica were to be 
executed. That water way can be easily prolonged by a system of 
rivers and canals to the Baltic. Thus from Danzig, the Vistula 
is navigable all through Russian Poland. Further up, the Vis- 
tula can be canalized and connected with the River March in 
Czecho-Slovakia which empties in the Danube near Pressburg. 
From there the Danube carries us to Smederevo, then the Morava 
and the Vardar through Serbia will bring us to Salonica. This 
navigable water way all through the countries independent of 
Germany would offer to all Baltic countries a sure water way to 
Suez shorter by 2,000 miles than the route now existing all around 
Europe. This water way would only emphasize the political and 
economic importance of a Danubian confederation. 

The readers can see that such a confederation is not a beautiful 
dream of dreamers, but a practical and a most advantageous 
solution of future problems in southeastern Europe. It must not 
and cannot be realized by force but by enlightenment and free will 
of all the peoples concerned. For the present moment the whole 
question hinges upon the attitude of the Magyars after the sign- 
ing of the world peace. It can be put thus : Will they continue to 
be a wedge or will they become a link between the neighboring 
nations? 

What will be the policy of those nations depends upon what will 
be their philosophy, since the policy of a nation is the practical 
application of its philosophy. The Danubian^peoples, in fact all 
the nations of Europe, are in need of a new philosophy. They 
look to America for this. Is there something ironically tragic in 
this looking? Will, or can America seize this opportunity to 
become the teacher for the nations of a philosophy of reconcilia- 
tion and contentment? 



Russia — Present and Future 

By R. M. Story, Ph.D.i 

International Committee of Young Mens' Christian Associations. 

T3 USSIA is reaping the whirlwind. For generations her 
^ ^ autocrats and bureaucrats, her priests and teachers, her 
professional men and merchant princes have sowed the wind. 
Clothed with responsibilities, endowed with power, and faced with 
opportunities such as rarely fall to the lot of any leaders, they 
stupidly chose to dig a pit of selfishness. Blinded with their own 
conceits they overreached themselves, and plunged down headlong 
dragging their people with them. In all the hellish misery of the 
present hour in Russia, one hears from their lips no word of con- 
trition and no plea for forgiveness. The Almighty may have 
mercy upon them, but in Russia they are already numbered 
among the damned. 

CZARISM AND BOLSHEVISM 

Bolshevism is the whirlwind; it is the offspring of czarism, but 
not more hideous either in principle or in method. Conceived in 
utter selfishness and in basest materialism it carries within its 
own bosom the seeds of its destruction. Like the parent tyranny 
from which it sprang, it is without conscience and without a god. 
"We are frankly anti-Christian," announced the head of the 
Bolshevik Bureau of Social Welfare to a representative of the 
Y. M. C. A.; to which the faith of a Christian replies, "Then you 
will fail." 

Czarism has- passed away ; it was not truly Russian either in its 
spirit or in its working. It was founded on the sand; under the 
storm and flood of war it fell, and great has been the fall of it. 
Bolshevism, its child, also builds on the sands of class-rule, hatred, 
strife, jealousy and selfishness. It mocks international obliga- 
tions and revels in intrigue. With audacious impertinence it 
seeks to override existing democracies and voices its claim to 

1 The author is a member of the faculty of the University of Illinois, Depart- 
ment of Political Science, on leave of absence for work in Russia under the 
auspices of the Y. M. C. A. 1917-18. 
7 81 



82 The Annals of the American Academy 

world dominion. One cannot imagine the consummation of its 
program, even in Russia. Any social structure which is to 
endure in Russia, must be founded upon the enduring rock of good 
in the character and the past experience of the Russian people. 

The Russian Character- 

One who has been through the agony of the past two years 
with Russians can realize how deep are the strata of love, for- 
giveness, patience and meekness; how universal the common 
sense and humor; how strong the mental fibre; how glowing the 
desire for knowledge; how wonderful the already developed 
capacity for cooperative effort; how rich the simple culture; how 
reverent and noble and genuine the religious life of this great 
people. No lust of conquest or imperial ambitions motivate 
them. The average Russian believes in the golden rule as a prac- 
tical proposition. His fine idealism and rugged good sense will 
ultimately turn to confusion the counsel both of hypocritical 
bourgeoisie and demagogic bolshevist. It is in the faith that 
neither of these pretenders to authoritative speech voices the real 
mind and will of Russia, that one can view her present plight 
without despair or even trepidation, and look to her future with 
confidence and assurance. 

One is not unmindful of the present woes and horrors which 
have overtaken this long-suffering people. Would that it were 
possible to blot from memory some of the unutterable infamies 
which have been perpetrated by both sides in this terrible civil 
war! Only too well known are the embittered ruthlessness and 
calculated terrors of the bolshevist program, both in its conception 
and in its execution. These men had good teachers. On the 
other hand are the arrogant, swaggering, imperialistic militarists, 
the record of whose deeds will make even the Prussian jealous 
when the scalpel of history bares it to the world. And what shall 
one say of those who follow in their wake, the soulless, vulturous 
creatures, who from their emigre havens outside of Russia have 
been calling upon the world to rescue their prey for them ! Neither 
side in the Russian civil war has a monopoly of coup d'etats, 
Chinese mercenaries and Machiavellian principles and methods. 
The great majority of^the Russian people quite wisely prefer to 
endure stoically the pains of the present rather than cast in their 



Russia — ^Present and Future 83 

lot with either of the principal groups aspiring for power, for 
neither group knows what it is to respect public opinion, to have 
regard for ordered liberty, to love international morality, or to 
recognize the principles and practices of democracy. It is quite 
easy, entertaining and popular to paint the lurid and the out- 
rageous . One may indulge in this pastime exclusively, may remain 
wholly faithful to the facts in every instance related, and with 
the mass of accumulated evidence may continue such portrayal 
almost indefinitely. Yet such a portrayal would not truly repre- 
sent normal conditions in Russia today. As in the case of Uncle 
Tom's Cabin, granted that every detail related could be sub- 
stantiated, yet the aggregate impression conveyed is wrong. 
The dislocation in life, industry and transport is severe. The 
sufferings endured are often intense, but there is no such unin- 
terrupted carnival of blood and crime, no such wallow of corrup- 
tion, as the more picturesque reports would have one believe. 
There is less of disorder and suffering in bolshevik Russia, and less 
of stability in non-bolshevik Russia, than is generally indicated. 
Allowing for the effects of the war, the masses of the Russian 
people know little more of oppression today than they have known 
in generations past. Large sections of the country are com- 
paratively quiet. The impairment of former conditions of life 
has not come quickly. The disruption of normal life began in 
1914, and affairs have grown progressively worse from then till 
now. Individual and social adjustments have to some extent 
kept pace with misfortune and there has been no sudden or over- 
whelming collapse. The nearest approach to it followed the 
demobilization of the army. The only explanations for Russia's 
survival of that supreme test are found in prohibition, the aver- 
age man's good sense, the faithfulness of the railway employes, 
and the wide distribution of the shock. 

The Effect of the European War 

I entered Russia before the bolshevik revolution. The country 
had been three years at war. It had already been gutted as by 
fire. Vast areas had been swept over by the contending forces. 
Man-power, industry, financial stability and transport had been 
sacrificed to the terrible demands of the struggle with Germany. 
Twenty million men had been mobilized for the armies, and the 



84 The Annals of the American Academy 

armies had suffered nine million casualties including prisoners. 
Agriculture, the principal industry, had suffered no less than 
manufacture. Roubles were selling for five cents in Vladivostok, 
and you can buy them no cheaper today. Bank credits were 
grossly over extended through war loans and speculative activities. 
The vice-president of the Zemsky Soiuz informed me in Novem- 
ber, 1917, that the productive capacity of his organization — a fair 
example — in the Moscow district had fallen from 40 to 60 per 
cent during the preceding year. Trains were running from three 
days to a week late on the Trans-Siberian. The morale of the 
army was gone, and many competent observers, British, French, 
Belgian, and Czech soldiers, who had been fighting with the 
army, testify that there was little chance for the restoration 
of that morale after the disasters in the fall of 1916. 

Russia was already prostrate when swept by the revolution. 
She was prostrate not only because of the corrupt and incapable 
leadership to which her destinies had been committed; not only 
because of her military defeats and economic insufficiency; but 
prostrate because her masses in their ignorance did not compre- 
hend the significance of the conflict. If Russia was already 
prostrate in 1917, what has transpired since then may be viewed 
in the nature of a misdirected protest; a protest which aggravates 
rather than betters the misfortunes against which it is directed, 
but which can be greatly overestimated in its importance. 

The person who fastens his attention upon the disasters of the 
war, or gives way to undue concern regarding bolshevism or 
attaches his hopes to the success of the Siberian, North Russian 
and other ostensible champions of constitutional government, 
will certainly fail in any just approximation of the future of 
Russia. These may all affect, but they will not determine, that 
future. There is so much bolshevism in anti-bolshevik Russia 
and so much anti-bolshevism in bolshevik Russia that the fate of 
the momentous issues at stake in Russia cannot possibly be de- 
cided by mere changes in battle lines or even by the rise and fall 
of temporary antagonists for power. The situation is far more 
baffling in its complexities; far more astounding in its contradic- 
tions; and far less susceptible of analysis or even intelligent 
observation than the majority of foreigners, who have been there, 
like to admit. The wise student of Russia's future will rather 



Russia — ^Present and Future 85 

seek to ascertain and study the great underlying currents of Rus- 
sian life and thought. He will seek out the fundamental and 
substantial elements of former social organization and practice 
and the individual virtues that are universally recognized as sig- 
nificant in the lives and destinies of peoples who seek to be free. 

The Future 

The fundamental present facts which in my opinion have per- 
manent bearing on Russia's future are: 

1. Russia is rich in her natural resources, so wondrously rich 
that the average American literally has no conception of the 
tremendous possibilities of the great Slavic domain. Natural 
resources of this character are vital. Upon them national life 
may draw for its recuperation, if the will and the determination to 
recover are present. It is, therefore, to the characteristics of the 
Russian people and to their social institutions that one must 
address himself if he is to know whether Russia will recover. 

2. The true Russian spirit is tolerant, democratic, spon- 
taneous and unspoiled, if one may judge by the soldiers and the 
peasants. Wanting much in self -discipline and the spirit, of com- 
promise yet they knew not arrogance nor false pride, nor was 
there in them any servility; they were free men. One of them in 
the rapture of his freedom expressed it thus, "I have known 
what it is to be free. To have had one day of the revolution is 
better than all my previous existence." 

3. The Russian temper is radical in its attitude toward political, 
social and economic problems. It is definitely intended that the 
old order shall not continue in the new nation which the people 
aspire to build. For example, in all of my travels in Russia, I did 
not meet with a single Russian who wished to see American social 
and economic civilization reproduced in his country. It is upon 
the vision of a better social order that the bolshevist regime has 
built up its power, but no one who knows the radicalism of the 
average Russian can for a moment believe that his conception of 
the better social order will permanently admit of the substitution 
of a new tyranny in place of the old. 

Moreover, if Russia appears radical from our point of view, 
we should bear in mind that she may not be so radical from her 
own standpoint. Private property has never enjoyed the recog- 



86 The Annals of the American Academy 

nition in Russia which it has in America and in western Europe. 
If in the working out of their social vision, the Russian people 
choose to modify still further the recognition which it has hereto- 
fore had, it will be but the confirmation of a tendency long since 
established. 

4. Russia is rich in social experience as well as in natural re- 
sources, democratic in spirit and radical in temper. In his bitter 
struggle for a better world, the peasant has learned the value of 
cooperative enterprise. The cooperative buying, selling and 
banking organizations of Russia and Siberia are among the 
great institutions developed in former years. Except in a very 
limited sense, these great cooperatives have restricted themselves 
to buying and selling and banking, but it will be surprising indeed 
if the economic rehabilitation of Russia in manufacturing and 
mining does not come about through the application of the coop- 
erative principles already well established. I see no other method 
of economic readjustment that is in keeping with the social views 
of the masses and the practical problems involved. 

5. The Russian people are poor in education. Yet I have never 
been any other place where the intellectual hunger is as keen and 
insatiable as it is in Russia. To think that this desire for knowl- 
edge has been the object of much of the repression and oppression 
which the Russian people have undergone ! One of the great and 
crying needs of Russia today, one which all substantial elements 
of the population seem unanimous in their desire to realize, is 
education. Sad as it is to witness the levelling down of the insti- 
tutions of higher learning in Russia, it is but a part of the retribu- 
tion which has swept in upon the privileged classes. The Uni- 
versities of Moscow and Petrograd and similar institutions may 
have been demoted from their high calling, but they are being 
definitely related to the most immediate and pressing educational 
needs of the Russian people. 

6. Russia has genuine unity, cultural, political, economic, and 
religious. After admitting the present potency of the separatist 
and disruptive forces which are at M^ork, one must still face the 
great underlying unity of culture. A common medium of speech 
and a universal body of literature, song, art and custom continue. 
These create a desire for political unity. Many Lithuanians, 
Ukrainians, Siberians and even Poles have privately recognized 



Russia — ^Present and Future 87 

the ultimate necessity of a federal union of the component parts 
of what was formerly the Russian empire. A separatist move- 
ment in Siberia in 1918 received no substantial support. The 
economic interests of the various sections of the old empire are 
already knit together in a fashion so plain and substantial that 
the separatist tendencies which are present have before them an 
exceedingly difficult struggle if they are to prevail. The cultural, 
political and economic unity is reinforced by a spiritual unity 
which obtains throughout Great Russia, Ukraine and Siberia, 
and which has planted its roots deeply in the furthermost corners 
of the old empire. It is a force — manifested chiefly in the Ortho- 
dox church — which is under a cloud today, but which is potent 
in its capacity for future influence upon the destinies of Russia. 
Finally there is geographical unity. As I travelled over Russia 
and Siberia, I was frequently reminded of the Honorable James 
Bryce's dictum in regard to our own Mississippi Valley — it was 
meant to be the home of one people. The geographical unity has 
been emphasized by a remarkable system of river, railway and 
canal transportation, which strengthens at every point the other 
elements of unity. I cannot believe that the forces of unity and 
integration have been more than temporarily suspended by the 
conditions which now obtain. 

7. In its governmental institutions, one must bear in mind 
that Russia has had a minimum of political experience with 
democracy; that it is without trusted political leaders, without 
tried and proven popular institutions of government and without 
the stabilizing influence of political traditions. 

It is not altogether clear to me that the village mir or the 
Zemstvos or the Duma, either municipal or national, are to endure. 
It is very doubtful if they command popular confidence and sup- 
port. My own impressions are that they do not now do so. The 
soviet, on the other hand, has gathered around it the loyalty and 
enthusiasm of the revolutionary movement, and has the honor 
of having saved the social and economic character of the revolu- 
tionary movement. It has innumerable defects. But its con- 
stitution is still in the formative state and is undergoing rapid 
modifications. The fgreat importance of the soviet lies in the 
fact that it is the only political institution in which the Russian 
people seem to have confidence. The average Russian peasant. 



88 The Annals of the American Academy 

or the workingman,has little trust or interest even in a Con- 
stituent Assembly; he will tell you his fear that though he were 
in a majority he could not control it because of his political inex- 
perience. In the soviet, on the other hand, he believes he can 
ultimately make his point and maintain it. He will admit that it 
may be perverted and often has been, but will deny that such 
perversion can be long or continuously maintained. In this 
confidence which the masses of the population have in the soviet 
and in its own capacity for rapid change and development lie the 
possibilities of its future. My impression is that it must be 
reckoned with in any consideration of the future of Russia. 

In conclusion, let me suggest a few of the things which it seems 
to me we may confidently expect to come out of Russia's present 
struggle. 

1. The rehabilitation of the Russian state on some federative 
basis, which will include the Balkan provinces, the Ukraine, 
the Caucasus, and Siberiaj but will almost certainly exclude 
Poland and Finland. 

2. The application of state ownership and control to transpor- 
tation, education, certain banking and financial functions, and 
welfare work. 

3. A cooperative rural and industrial economy, based upon 
past experiences and prevailing ideals. 

4. Considerable latitude for private initiative and corporate 
activity. The field for such developments, however, will be 
limited as compared with what today exists in the United States. 

5. The definite abandonment of militaristic and imperialistic 
programs of the past and of the wild radicalism of the present; a 
wholehearted committal to international peace, to the intensive 
development of the native character, culture, institutions and 
resources. 

6. There are yet many long years of civil war and strife ahead 
of Russia. It will not be surprising if revolution follows revolu- 
tion, so wide spread is the unrest, so inadequate the leadership, 
and so poor are the facilities for effective expression of public 
opinion. Yet, despite this unhappy prospect, one who has been in 
Russia and has come to know her people can hardly doubt her 
future. If it is impossible to explainjRussia, if it is beyond us 
even to understand and comprehend her, one can yet have faith in 



Russia — Present and Future 89 

her. And it is a remarkable fact that those of my associates who 
have known Russia longest trust her most. 

For Americans who have such faith, there is open the privilege 
of an unselfish and sympathetic assistance to a people who need 
help and who welcome and appreciate it when rendered. There 
can be no sure method of helping Russia that is not founded on 
the law of love and mutual respect. The soul of the new Russia 
will spurn any other. 



The Russian Tragedy 
By W. C. Huntington 

Commercial Attache, formerly of the American Embassy, Petrograd, now in 
charge of Russian Division, United States Department of Commerce 

T3HYSICALLY, Russia covers over one-seventh of the surface 
-*■ of the earth, but in thought present-day Russia has come to 
cover the whole world. The Russian problem is fundamental and 
elemental, and its roots are deep struck and in all directions in 
our modern life. 

The Russia of today is not interesting chiefly because of its art 
or quaint customs, its embroidery or church music, but because 
it is a seismograph of political and social movements, on whose 
dial in great sweeps of the needle can be observed indications of 
what are still only faint rumblings in other places. Again, Russia 
is a social laboratory in which vivisection is practiced with a 
vengeance. Russia is offering up a vicarious sacrifice for the 
benefit and instruction of us all, and we can hardly stand by coldly 
or without sympathy and see this sacrifice made. 

It is very difficult for the American here at home to encompass 
the Russian problem. It is so huge and so new that more time 
is needed to get the full perspective. Russia has not been a popu- 
lar subject in the past, and most students lack the absolutely 
essential background to consider the subject. Newspaper ac- 
counts have been fragmentary, which is by no means to say 
that all newspaper accounts, as is frequently stated, are untruth- 
ful. As an eyewitness, I can say that, in spite of error and exag- 
geration, the general tenor of these accounts, which picture the 
conditions in Russia as very bad, is correct. 

iJ Of the Americans who were in Russia before and during the 
revolutionary period, most were idealists and well-wishers of 
the country; few, however, had the necessary equipment to study 
a situation where political and social phenomena have taken place 
at such rapid speed; and there have been, therefore, many inac- 
curate observers and, worse still, false teachers. So much of the 
discussion about Russia is not about Russia at all, but about 
political and social fundamentals, which the Russian situation 



The Russian Tragedy 91 

has brought to light, between people who differ beyond the pos- 
sibility of compromise in their political and social conceptions, 
and each of whom hopes to see iii Russia the vindication of his 
viewy^ The constructive purpose of this paper is to try to discover 
some logic in all the tangle of ideas and give you, if possible, 
foundation and materials for your own further study and think- 
ing. 

In doing this, I assume that I am writing as a student for stu- 
dents and as a liberal for liberals. By liberals I mean those who 
have an open mind, a profound consciousness of their social obliga- 
tion and a sense of values too profound to permit them to cast 
lightly away the old until the new has been tested. With such 
an equipment one can attack the Russian problem. I cannot for- 
bear to say, as one who cherishes an affection for Russia, that she 
needs friends, and especially American friends. She needs senti- 
ment of the best kind, but she does not need sentimentalism. 
The appeal of Russia is of such dimensions that it approximates a 
religious experience. However, there are varieties of religious 
experience, and emotionalism is not the best variety. Many 
well intentioned people, or adventurous people, seem to feel that 
when they approach the Russian problem they abandon all their 
former standards. This is an absolute mistake. Russia is not 
an exception in human nature; rather the Russian people are the 
most profoundly and intensely human that I have ever seen. 

Now Russia is a tragedy, and America and the Anglo-Saxon 
world a comedy. We play the game to win, but to be beaten 
before you start has been the perspective that has faced Russians 
for centuries. This vein runs through all their literature. As an 
instance, recently a conference class in English literature at the 
University of Toronto was discussing Matthew Arnold's definition 
of poetry, in w^hich he said it must be pleasing (doubtless in form 
and style). A Russian girl student in that class rose excitedly 
and said, "That definition is untrue. Poetry is literature, litera- 
ture depicts life, and life is not pleasing." 

From the economist's viewpoint, Russia is a natural tragedy, 
because of three great factors : (a) Its isolation from the rest of 
Europe, (b) its vastness and unprotectedness against Asiatic 
raids, (c) its harsh climate. It is impossible to discuss the present 
and future of Russia without knowing something of the past. 



92 The Annals of the American Academy 

The three factors of the natural tragedy enumerated above finally 
brought about the consummation of the autocracy three hundred 
years ago. The people accepted this autocracy because they 
preferred it to anarchy and famine. Presently to that autocracy 
was added serfdom — analogous to the slavery of our colored 
people of the South — which lasted until the year of 1861, the year 
of our own Civil war. By serfdom nine-tenths of the population 
were bound to the land on which they were born, to be bought 
and sold with it. 

The Two Great Classes 

The great result of all this was to divide the Russian people 
into two classes, an upper one-tenth and a submerged nine-tenths, 
with a chasm between. Again from the economist's point of 
view, education and, hence production, were so backward in 
Russia that there was simply not enough produced to maintain 
much more than one-tenth on the scale of living which we have 
come to demand as normal. The upper tenth was composed 
primarily of the city dwellers, nobility, bureaucrats, professional 
classes, industrials and merchants. These look toward Western 
Europe; they often speak several languages. I have known cases 
amongst the wealthy where the children spoke French better 
than Russian ; they are versatile, attractive, but as a class unsound, 
because out of touch with the main body of their own people. I 
venture to say that, generally speaking, no class of people in a 
country is ever superior to or can separate itself from the accom- 
plishment of the country as a whole without hurting itself; and 
the quasi-mediaeval conditions in Russia, persisting because of 
the backwardness of the country, had an unfortunate efifect on 
the upper classes. The lower nine-tenths was composed of 
peasants in the country and their relatives who had come into 
the city to work in the factories. They were living for the most 
part as did the peasants in Western Europe two hundred years 
ago, undernourished and 90 per cent illiterate. 

The spectacle of the profound difference between the two great 
classes, of the backwardness which prevailed among the nine- 
tenths, and the tyranny which held the whole structure together, 
was the tragedy of Russia. This tragedy has produced the passive 
Christian virtues in which the Russians excel — pity, generosity. 



The Russian Tragedy 93 

' tolerance, human kindness, as well as a feeling that many have of 
living in eternity, that, since this life is not worth very much, they 
must turn to the prospect of another. But the tragedy has also 
produced the fundamental Russian faults: inertia and lack of 
initiative and decision. 

The Intelligentzia 

Autocracy, using the bureaucracy as an instrument of govern- 
ment and excluding even most of the upper one-tenth from par- 
ticipating in it, has not given the people an opportunity to train 
in democracy, and has helped to bring about radicalism, which 
is the dominant note in Russian political life and will remain 
so until the harsh economic situation is improved. From the 
tragedy sprang also the "intelligentzia" — a portion of the upper 
one-tenth, profoundly conscious of their social obligation and try- 
ing to bridge the gap between the upper one-tenth and the lower 
nine-tenths. The faults of this class are well known. Circum- 
stances made of them theorists, because they were denied opportu- 
nity for constructive efforts and participation in political life. 
They also suffered from the mentality of protest, the mentality 
which grows so accustomed to fighting certain evils that it has 
no plans for the time when these evils shall have been removed. 
Nevertheless, the intelligentzia has contained some of the noblest 
souls and most heroic strugglers for liberty of all time. 

The Russian Peasant 

As an offshoot of radical thought in Russia, it was most natural 
that socialism should be imported from Western Europe and that 
the labor movement of Russia should be under the socialist flag. 
Of course, political activity in Russia is always more or less on the 
edges and goes quite over the heads of the great mass of the people, 
who are the least known and the hardest to encompass, that is, the 
great mass of the peasantry. It is impossible to get a clear ex- 
pression of opinion on political questions from the amorphous 
mass, because of its inaccessibility, due to insufficient communica- 
tion, and because of its illiteracy and the limitations of its life 
experience. The Russian peasant is fundamentally of sound 
white stock and is bound to have a tremendous development. 
The war has had a great effect on him, but still he is essentially a 



94 The Annals of the American Academy 

shrewd man with a very narrow horizon. The Russian peasant is 
an elemental man, with a character fundamentally good and kind, 
but like all such men, he can be aroused to passion by preaching 
and agitating, and in that passion he can strike and be tremen- 
dously cruel; and he has been. 

The March Revolution 

In June of 1916 I arrived in Russia. I saw the manufacturing 
capacity of the country — ^never very large — concentrated on war 
production. I saw transportation — ^never sufficient, even before 
it had an army of millions of men to supply — overloaded. There 
was corruption in high places; there had been disaster at the 
front. The burden of war, while it drew out so many noble 
sacrijfices from all classes of people, was, nevertheless, breaking 
down Russia's insufficient economic apparatus and intensifying 
political and social disturbances. With ample supplies of food 
in the south of Russia, hunger came to Petrograd and to Moscow 
because the food was not transported. Finally, with the flower 
of the professional army gone, just this hunger produced riots in 
Petrograd and pulled the hair trigger on the loaded gun; and the 
revolution of March was on. 

On January 14, 1917, all the ambassadors in Petrograd and 
their staffs were presented to the Emperor at the New Year's 
reception at the Tsarskoe Selo. Two months afterward that same 
Emperor had abdicated for himself and his son, the Grand Duke 
Mikhail had refused to take the throne without a mandate from 
the Constituent Assembly, and the line of the executive authority 
was broken for the first time in three hundred years. The struggle 
for democracy was on. 

The Provisional Government and the Soviet 

Then we ran through those memorable eight months, the eight 
months of effort at democracy, of conflict between the provisional 
government and the soviet. When the Romanov dynasty was 
cut off, the Duma, which was Russia's only parliament, formed a 
committee. This committee attempted to take affairs in hand 
and, in accord with the soviet of workmen's and soldiers' deputies, 
appointed the provisional government of Russia, of which Prince 
Lvov was the Premier and in which Alexander Kerensky, who 
later rose to fame, sat as Minister of Justice. 



The Russian Tragedy 95 

"Soviet" is merely the Russian word for "council," and the 
soviet was a labor organization, primarily formed in the cities and 
only afterwards extended to the peasants, for the reason that the 
latter are more inaccessible and not politically conscious, as has 
been explained above. The soviet is not an old institution in 
Russia, but had its birth in the revolution of 1905, when Soviets of 
workmen were formed in all the chief cities. In the revolution 
of 1917 it also took in soldiers, a large part of whom were, of course, 
peasants, and jBnally it took in the peasants, who for a time had 
their own soviet. The soviet was socialistic, not bolshevistic, the 
Bolsheviki sitting in it as a small minority party, very active. 
The soviet organization did not aspire to govern, fearing to make 
a botch of government in such a crisis and discredit the cause of 
socialism. They sought to influence the provisional government, 
which was composed of bourgeois, i.e., not working people, 
with the exception of Kerensky, who was a member of the soviet. 
The leaders of the soviet were not rough workmen, but educated 
people, who had espoused the workmen's cause. 

The chasm between the upper one-tenth and the lower nine- 
tenths immediately became evident between the provisional gov- 
ernment and the soviet. This latter organization, in which there 
were so many restless spirits, desired to realize all manner of ideals 
instantly. There was no compromise, no team-work, because no 
one had ever been trained in democracy, and there was a very 
tremendous economic and military crisis which would have taxed 
the powers of any government to meet. Besides all this there 
was the constant work of the German spies, with which the coun- 
try was filled, and of the bolshevist group using German money. 
This produced in eight months the downfall of the effort toward 
democracy in Russia. 

Bolshevism — Its Meaning, Methods, and Failure 

In November came the bolshevik coup d'etat. Bolshe in Russian 
means "more"; bolshevik means a "maximalist," a man who 
stands for the maximum of a program, not the majority of the 
people, according to some misrepresentations. Menshe means 
'.'less," and the Mensheviki are the minimalists in the socialist 
movementy/The Bolsheviki, whose chief spokesman is Lenin, 
have always taken the stand of the whole-hogger. In theory. 



96 The Annals of the American Academy 

bolshevism is crude Marxian socialism by violence. Many of my 
Marxian friends deny this. The Berne Conference, by a large 
majority, repudiated bolshevism, but if you concede that they do 
in any degree strive toward socialist doctrines, then the great 
thing that distinguishes them from all other socialists is not their 
creed but their method, which is as old as the world. It is the 
method of "the end justifies the means," of personal opportunism, 
of absolute unscrupulousness. What they do is in the name, of 
course, of a great boon to be conferred on mankind. They are, 
like the Germans, wonderfully clever at using the basest side of 
human nature; they seem to know how to play on the meaner 
motives, such as cupidity. Lately the bolshevik propaganda 
organization in New York City, under the guise of commercial 
operations, has been offering American business men a bait of 
$200,000,000 in gold. It was surprising the serious attention 
which this perfectly absurd, from a business point of view, organ- 
ization received. 

It is the philosophy of "the end justifies the means," the philoso- 
phy of class warfare and of the terror, with which democracy 
can never compromise. Our conflict with bolshevism is as funda- 
mental as was our conflict with Germany. Karl Radek, writing 
in a bolshevist newspaper recently, made the issue plain, stating 
that now that the conflict between Wilson and the Kaiser was 
solved by the defeat of the latter, the struggle was on between 
Wilson and Lenin. The philosophy of "the end justifies the 
means " made it possible for the bolsheviks, although opposed to 
imperial Germany, to accept the tainted money of the Germans, 
and for the Germans to give the bolsheviks this money, although 
detesting them and their movement. 

The theory of the Bolsheviki calls for the class war, and they 
remain in government by the exercise of the terror. The chief 
characteristic of this terror is not its physical side, which is merely 
Russian bestial nature let loose, but the fact that official proclama- 
tions prescribe it and justify it. In America the sanctity of the 
home is held very high, and stories of the nationalization of women 
in Russia have attracted disproportionate attention. Such 
nationalization seems to have taken place in a number of locali- 
ties, but never upon the instructions of the central bolshevik 
government. What is more important to me is that Chicherin, 



The Russian Tragedy 97 

the bolshevik Commissary of Foreign Affairs, told one of my 
friends in Stockholm that the church and the home stood in the 
way of the progress of modern society and must be swept aside. 
Terrible as the methods of the Bolsheviki have been, they 
might perhaps be condoned had they obtained for the proletariat, 
whose name they use so often, the benefits which they promised. 
They have not. Russia is today a desert place. The cities of 
Petrograd and Moscow are prison places. It is not that the streets 
flow daily with blood — executions take place at night or in quiet 
districts — but it is the deadly weight of oppression that weighs 
on everything, the total lack of production and of activity. 
Today the Russian proletariat are not behind this movement, 
because they are hungry and out of a job and have no freedom. 
The peasants are not behind it, because they have seen that 
taking the land by violence has made no just distribution and has 
brought them strife. There is class warfare even in the villages 
between rich and poor peasants — and the rich peasant would seem 
very poor to you. Bolshevism is immoral in theory and an utter 
failure in economic practice. The time is approaching rapidly 
when this group will pass, and America should aid every con- 
structive Russian force which is contributing to this end. The 
reconstruction of Russia is particularly America's job; and there 
is no country which affords a greater field for the efforts of the 
spirit of service than Russia. No country draws on one so much. 
It is not sufficient to lend money or goods, but we shall have to 
lend ourselves, because there are too few brains per square mile. 
The Russian and the American character are very congenial. 



The Menace of Bolshevism 

By Baron Rosen 
Former Ambassador of Russia to the United States 

T T is needless for me to expatiate on the horrors of the bolshevist 
'■■ regime in Russia. Since the publication of the official reports 
of American and British representatives in Russia, the absolute 
truthfulness of which cannot be questioned for a moment, no 
fair-minded person may entertain any doubt whatever as to the 
reality of these horrors. And now we have an explanation from 
the lips of Lenin himself of the aims and policies pursued by 
the bolshevist tyrants of Russia. An extremely interesting report 
of this interview with Lenin will be found in the files of the 
New York Times for April 23rd. The report concludes as follows: 

Some of his remarks are sufficiently frank and illustrative of the sinister form 
of moral insanity, which distinguishes the bolshevist mind, to be a terrible warn- 
ing to Western Europe. 

I might mention that I happen to have in my possession a letter 
just received from a most distinguished English statesman, an 
old friend and colleague of mine, who writes : 

We have learned enough to know what Bolshevism is and by what detestable 
methods its sanguinary sway is marntaiaed. Nevertheless, there are persons, 
not a few, who refuse to believe ia the truth of the abominable crimes which 
continue to be committed by the Bolsheviks, and extend some sympathy to them 
merely because they profess to be the "friends of the proletariat," being really 
"hostes humani generis." This is one of the things which make one feel as if 
the world had gone mad. 

The Russian Information Bureau in New York published in the 
last issue of its paper Struggling Russia a most eloquent "Appeal 
to Humanity" from the pen of the famous writer Leonid Andreeff, 
who paints a picture of the appalling sufferings of the Russian 
people and especially of the unfortunate people still left alive in 
the doomed capital of what was once the empire of Russia, a pic- 
ture such as would profoundly move the heart of even the most 
callous cynic. An introductory remark of the editor expresses 
the hope that the so-called "parlor bolsheviks" will read it and 
will understand "the crime they are committing in going about 

98 



The Menace of Bolshevism 99 

and speaking of the regime of murder in Russia as a new and 
higher form of democracy." 

The formidable problem of bolshevism cannot be light heartedly 
passed by with similar shallow definitions. If one goes to the 
bottom of things, bolshevism is but the outbreak in a particularly 
virulent form of that old, chronic and incurable disease, with 
which civilized mankind is and probably always will remain 
afflicted — the everlasting strife between those who "have" and 
those who "have not." Incurable, because there is not and there 
never can be a sufficiency of the good things of this world to go 
round and, therefore, their enjoyment will always be limited to a 
small minority, whereas the thirst for such enjoyment among the 
great majority will constantly grow, as the contrast between 
the luxury and the ease of the few and the want and the limitations 
of the many becomes ever greater and more glaring. Discontent 
with the narrow limitations of a life condemned to incessant toil, 
joyless monotony and anxious insecurity, such as always will be 
the lot of the great majority of mankind, envy of the more fortu- 
nate and consequent class hatred — these are the seeds of the 
disease. They were and they are present everywhere. All that 
was needed to make them bear fruit^ — ^and that fruit was bol- 
shevism — was the short-sighted policy of the ruling classes of the 
leading nations of the world. The wasting of untold billions of 
the people's wealth on gigantic armaments and finally on a fratri- 
cidal war of mutual extermination, instead of devoting, say only 
a tenth part of the colossal treasure thus wasted to the bettering 
of the lot and the lightening of the burden of the toiling masses. 
Such was the policy that produced and always will produce 
bolshevism and anarchy. 

It was the suicidal feud between the ruling classes of the leading 
nations that created the opportunity for bolshevism to raise its 
head. The problem of how to deal with it stares us in the face 
now — ^not Russia alone, nor Germany, but the whole civilized 
world. One thing is certain: the problem of bolshevism can 
be solved only by all civilized mankind acting in concert to put 
it down. The ruling classes of all nations are a minority, but they 
have a sacred duty to perform; not towards themselves, which 
would only be acting in self-defence, but towards their peoples. 
The triumph of bolshevism would mean the utter ruin not only 



100 The Annals of the American Academy 

of the "classes" but of the "masses" as well. That is the lesson 
which the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat in 
Russia is teaching the world. 

At present the problem of the immediate future of Russia is 
one of unexampled difficulty. Its solution is urgently required in 
the common interest of all civilized mankind, for if bolshevism 
be suffered to spread it may ultimately come to mean the doom 
of our race and civilization. The task of seeking such a solution 
should be approached in a spirit free from partisanship and from 
the passions of international hatred bred by the world war. In 
others words, what is primarily needed is the total elimination 
from the consideration of the Russian problem of the fatally per- 
turbing element of the relationship between Russia and the 
Entente Powers on one side, and Russia and the Central Powers 
on the other. It stands to reason that this can be brought about 
only by the final conclusion, if not of a general peace, at least of 
peace between the Powers of the Entente and the Central Powers. 
No peace can evidently be general without the participation of 
Russia, nor can any league of nations be complete without includ- 
ing a nation numbering still some 120,000,000 to 130,000,000 souls 
and occupying almost a seventh part of the surface of the inhabit- 
able globe. But then Russia as a political entity has temporarily 
ceased to exist and there is at present no political party, nor body 
of men who could be held to be entitled to enter upon international 
engagements in the name of Russia and the Russian nation — 
least of all that small group of demented fanatics with their fol- 
lowing of murderous bandits who have usurped power by violence, 
who maintain their tyrannical power by a regime of terrorism 
such as the world has never yet seen, who have completely ruined 
and destroyed the social fabric of the state, and who have turned 
what was once the empire of Russia into a wilderness of primitive 
barbarism — a prison, a lunatic asylum and a slaughter house. 

No one can tell as yet when and how the time will come when 
the world will again behold Russia reconstituted as a political 
entity and able to resume her place in the family of nations and 
her status as one of the great powers. For the present all our 
hopes seem to lie in the evolution out of the prevailing chaos of a 
military dictatorship such as must always be the outcome of a 
prolonged state of anarchy, if the teachings of history are to be 



The Menace of Bolshevism 101 

believed. Some indications of the possibility of such a develop- 
ment are already discernible. Admiral Kolchak, the head of the 
Siberian government, having secured the recognition of his 
authority by General Denikine and other commanders of loyal 
Russian troops, has begun to use in his public utterances the firm 
language of a dictator conscious of his power and determined to 
render his will supreme. The task awaiting him — the task of 
reestablishing the reign of law and order and of reuniting the 
shattered nation — is one of colossal magnitude and unequalled 
difficulty. To cope with it successfully will require the strength 
of a Napoleon or a Peter the Great. In working it out he will 
sorely need the moral support and such material assistance as 
may be found possible to extend to him from all well-wishers of 
the Russian people and all those who desire that Russia should be 
enabled as soon as possible to resume the place belonging to her by 
birthright in the family of nations. This task once accomplished 
it will be for the Russian people themselves to decide under what 
form of government they will desire to live. 

One hears sometimes expressed by well-meaning people the 
opinion that the "soviet government" after all represents the 
majority of the people of what was once the empire of Russia. 
This delusion is apparently a fruit of the curious fascination which 
the establishment of the autocracy of the proletariat exercises 
over the minds of people totally ignorant of the condition of 
abject wretchedness to which bolshevism and its organ, the 
"soviet government," have reduced a once great and prosperous 
nation. The fact, however, is that this so-called government is 
bitterly hated by the overwhelming majority of the Russian 
people, and not the least so by those unfortunates who, to save 
themselves and their wives and children from starvation, are 
forcibly compelled to give it their reluctant services. 



Democracy and Bolshevism 

By A. J. Sack 

Director of the Russian Information Bureau in the United States 

rpHE Russian problem became the central European problem, 
■^ and the central world problem, not a year ago, not two years 
ago, not since the revolution of March, 1917. The Russian prob- 
lem has been the central European and the central world problem 
for several decades. 

Let us go back to the revolution in 1905, the first open revolt of 
the people against the Czar's rule. If you will recall the events 
of the revolution of 1905-1906, you will recall also that there 
were moments in this revolution when it seemed that victory 
would rest with the people. In October, 1905, the Czar had to 
grant a constitution. In April, 1906, when the first Duma pre- 
sented the Czar with an address demanding liberal reforms, the 
structure of the old regime was tottering. Do you realize what 
happened to the entire world at the moment when the Russian 
people, the democracy of Russia, was defeated by the Czar's 
government in 1906? 

If you will recall the German literature, the military writings 
and even the general press, before 1914, you will find that the 
plan openly discussed by the German press was, in case of war, 
to crush France first and then turn to the East to meet the Rus- 
sian armies. The German logic was that since the Czar's gov- 
ernment was so unpopular in Russia, the population would not 
answer the Czar's call for mobilization, and that very probably 
a declaration of war would throw all Russia into the flames of a 
revolution. Consequently the Germans would have time enough 
to rush to Paris, to defeat France, and then turn to the Eastern 
front and snap up Russia, all in revolutionary flames. It is 
probable that, had the revolution in 1905 been successful, then 
nine years later, in 1914, Russia as a nation would have been so 
strongly united, and the alliance of a democratic Russia with the 
democracies of France and England would have been so natural 
that the German militarists and imperialists would not even have 
thought of starting the European slaughter. That means that 

102 



Democracy and Bolshevism 103 

in 1906, when the Russian revolution was defeated, at that very 
moment a death sentence was signed for the children of thirteen 
to fifteen who were then innocently playing in the streets of 
Europe and of America. 

The fate, therefore, of Europe and almost of the entire world 
depended on the events of the first revolution in Russia. It is 
time to understand that during the last half century the cul- 
tural, the commercial, the technical and the financial bonds be- 
tween civilized peoples have grown so strong that the nations of 
the world have, in reality, become one body and one soul, and 
when there is an infection in one part of the body the entire body 
is in danger. The establishment of a stable, democratic govern- 
ment in Russia is a necessity for the entire world, and therefore 
the world cannot afford to remain indifferent to the political 
developments in Russia. 

The March revolution brought into existence Prince Lvov's 
and then Kerensky's Cabinet. Events in Russia during the 
past two years are in the main a death-grapple between the 
Socialists, who held the majority in the provisional government, 
and the Bolsheviki. There is a difference between socialism and 
bolshevism, and this difference must be thoroughly understood by 
every liberal-minded person. Socialism means governmental 
control over production and distribution; and the great teacher 
of scientific socialism, Karl Marx, was at the same time the 
great teacher of the law of evolution. All of us would like to 
jump from this modern life with its unpleasantness, direct to 
paradise. But a perfect state is possible — if possible at all — 
only after centuries of development, and the great teacher of 
scientific socialism, Karl Marx, understood this better than any- 
one else. Believing in socialism, believing that governmental 
control over production and distribution would open a new era in 
the life of society, Karl Marx taught that socialism is possible 
only after capitalistic development. The historic mission of 
capitalism, according to Karl Marx, is the development through 
private competition of the productive forces of society. Only 
after the productive forces are developed and wealth is concen- 
trated practically in the hands of a few can the democratic state 
enter and substitute governmental control for the control of 
private interests. The Socialists of Russia, the Social-Democrats 



104 The Annals of the American Academy 

and Socialists-Revolutionists as well, understood the prosaic 
law of evolution. The difference between the Socialists and the 
Bolsheviki is plain. While the Socialists of Russia, most of them, 
are responsible leaders, the Bolsheviki are demagogues. In the 
fall of 1917 the Bolsheviki came to power because they gave the 
suffering masses of the Russian people promises which they have 
never been able to fulfil. At the moment of the bolshevist revolt, 
in November, 1917, there was over 8,000,000 casualties in the 
Russian army, with about 3,000,000 dead and about 1,000,000 
disabled for life. Only an industrially developed country is able 
to wage a modern war, and you cannot imagine what it meant for 
poorly developed Russia to wage war against Germany, Austria- 
Hungary and Turkey during the three years. The Russian 
masses were anxious for peace. Not for a separate peace with 
the German imperialists but, if possible, for a general democratic 
peace. The responsible leaders, the provisional government, 
frankly stated to the masses of the Russian people that such a 
peace could not be obtained at that moment; that although bleed- 
ing and suffering, Russia must continue the war together with 
her Allies until German militarism was broken. Irresponsible 
bolshevist demagogues approached the masses with promises of 
immediate democratic peace, and more than this — of immediate 
realization of socialism in Russia. With the help of the German 
militaristic machinery they overthrew the provisional government 
and, after coming to power, brought to the people, instead of a 
general democratic peace, a shameful, separate peace with the 
German imperialists; instead of bread and happiness and imme- 
diate realization of socialism, a regime of starvation, destruction, 
murder in those parts of Russia where bolshevism rules. 

The Bolsheviki are camouflaging their regime with the terms 
"socialism," and "democracy." In truth their regime is a 
caricature of these two great ideals. No one who knows the 
nature of socialism will ever consider the Bolsheviki as Socialists, 
and no one who knows the nature of democracy will consider the 
Bolsheviki as democrats. The Bolsheviki do not recognize 
the fundamental principle of democracy — the right of every mem- 
ber of society, men and women, to participate in the government. 
According to the so-called soviet constitution there are entire 
classes of the population which are excluded from the government. 



Democracy and Bolshevism 105 

And I wish to call attention to the fact that this soviet constitu- 
tion, undemocratic as it is, is still better than the practical appli- 
cation of this constitution to Russian life. The Bolsheviki have 
excluded from the government not only entire classes of the Rus- 
sian population, but they have excluded all the political parties 
which are opposed to their regime, the Liberals, the Constitu- 
tional-Democratic party, the Social-Democrats, the Mensheviki 
and the Socialists-Revolutionists. 

To conclude this brief sketch of the characteristics of the bol- 
shevist regime and its relation to the ideas of socialism and 
democracy, I shall quote now a document which, iu my opinion, 
is one of the most important documents describing the conditions 
in Bolshevist Russia. It is the text of a telegram sent by the 
British High Commissioner, Mr. Bruce Lockhart, to the British 
Foreign Office on November 10, 1918, as published in the official 
British White Book on Bolshevism. Mr. Lockhart telegraphed: 

The following points may interest Mr. Balfour: 

1. The Bolsheviki have established a rule of force and oppression unequalled 
in the history of any autocracy. 

2. Themselves the fiercest upholders of the right of free speech, they have 
suppressed, since coming into power, every newspaper which does not approve 
their policy. In this respect the socialist press has suffered most of all. Even 
the papers of the Internationalist Mensheviki, like Martov's, have been sup- 
pressed and closed down, and the unfortimate editors thrown into prison or 
forced to flee for their lives. 

3. The right of holding public meetings has been abolished. The vote has 
been taken away from everyone except the workmen in the factories and the 
poorer servants, and even amongst the workmen those who dare to vote against 
the Bolsheviki are marked down by the bolshevist secret police as counter- 
revolutionaries, and are fortunate if their worst fate is to be thrown into prison, 
of which in Russia today it may truly be said, "many go in but few come out." 

4. The worst crimes of the Bolsheviki have been against their socialist oppo- 
nents. Of the countless executions which the Bolsheviki have carried out a large 
percentage has fallen on the heads of Socialists who had waged a life-long struggle 
against the old regime, but who are now denounced as coimter-revolutionaries 
merely because they disapprove of the manner in which the Bolsheviki have 
discredited sociaUsm. 

^ 5. The Bolsheviki have abolished even the most primitive forms of justice. 
Thousands of men and women have been shot without even the mockery of a 
trial, and thousands more are left to rot in the prisons imder conditions to find a 
parallel to which one must turn to the darkest annals of Indian or Chinese 
history. 



106 The Annals of the American Academy 

6. The Bolsheviki have restored the barbarous methods of torture. The 
exammation of prisoners frequently takes place with a revolver at the unfortu- 
nate prisoner's head. 

7. The Bolsheviki have established the odious practice of taking hostages. 
Still worse, they have struck at their political opponents through their women 
folk. When recently a long Ust of hostages was published in Petrograd, the 
Bolsheviki seized the wives of those men whom they could not find and threw 
them into prison until their husbands should give themselves up. 

8. The Bolsheviki, who destroyed the Russian army, and who have always 
been the avowed opponents of militarism, have forcibly mobilized oflScers who 
do not share their political views, but whose technical knowledge is indispen- 
sable, and by the threat of immediate execution have forced them to fight against 
their fellow-countrymen in a civil war of unparalleled horror. 

9. The avowed ambition of Lenin is to create civil warfare throughout Europe. 
Every speech of Lenin's is a denunciation of constitutional methods, and a 
glorification of the doctrine of physical force. With that object in view he is 
destroying systematically, both by execution and by deliberate starvation, 
every form of opposition to bolshevism. This system of "terror" is aimed 
chiefly at the Liberals and non-Bolshevist Socialists, whom Lenin regards as his 
most dangerous opponents. 

10. In order to maintain their popularity with the workingmen and with 
their hired mercenaries, the Bolsheviki are paying their supporters enormous 
wages by means of an unchecked paper issue, until today money in Russia has 
naturally lost all value. Even according to their own figures, the Bolsheviki's 
expenditure exceeds the revenue by thousands of millions of roubles per annum. 

Such is the picture of the bolshevist regime in Russia, and you 
can readily see that the Russian problem at this moment is prob- 
ably not so much a political as a moral problem. The Russian 
people are going through impossible tortures as a consequence of 
Russia's participation in the war. Loyal to her allies, Russia 
stood at her post for three long years, sacrificing not less than 
4,000,000 of her best sons. The strain of this war was too 
great for Russia and she collapsed, and the bolshevist regime is 
the result of the breakdown of her economic life. Russia is lying 
now in seas of blood and tears because she has sacrificed every- 
thing for the Allied cause. It is up to the Allies to help her. 

To help Russia means to help the Russian people and not those 
who have established in Russia a new tyranny worse even than 
the old tyranny of the Czars. Russia's salvation lies in the estab- 
lishment of a stable, democratic government through a Con- 
stituent Assembly freely chosen by the entire population on the 
basis of universal, direct, se(iret and equal suffrage. The Bol- 



Democracy and Bolshevism 107 

sheviki dispersed the first AU-Russian Constituent Assembly in 
January, 1918, at the point of bayonets, but the idea of a Con- 
stituent Assembly, which was one of the main aspirations of the 
great revolution of March, 1917, is still alive, and the greatest 
Russian liberal, revolutionary and socialist leaders, led by such 
people as Catherine Breshkovsky and Nicholas Tchaikovsky, still 
support this idea. The American democracy cannot remain 
indifferent to the tragedy of the Russian people. The time has 
come, in my sincere opinion, when the American people must 
speak for the Russian democracy against those who have destroyed 
the new democratic institutions in Russia, who have dispersed the 
first All-Russian Constituent Assembly and who are doing every- 
thing in their power to prevent the convocation of another Consti- 
tuent Assembly. Whatever may happen in Russia, democracy 
will finally win. Citizens of the United States, support the 
Democracy of Russia! 



The Soviet Republic 

By Santeri Nuorteva 

Secretary of the Bureau of the Representative in the United States of 
the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic 

\7^0J] cannot solve the Russian problem by emotionalism. You 
•■■ cannot explain the situation there by passion. You cannot 
settle it by denunciation. You cannot understand Russia by 
saying that this man did so and so and another did so and so, and 
if these men had not done so or had not been there everything 
would be diflferent. The Russian problem is not so simple as that, 
because it is a sociological problem. 

I shall confine myself to pointing out just one outstanding 
economic fact in this sociological problem — namely, the land ques- 
tion. That has been the fundamental question in Russia for 
years and years. The peasants have made attempts to confiscate 
the land in Russia many, many times before the Soviet revolution. 
The peasants never had enough land. The Czar's government 
was too reactionary to present a solution of the land question 
even in such forms as have been accepted by so-called liberal 
capitalism in Western Europe. I refer to such solutions as, for 
example, were reached in the Irish land question, where the 
landlords were bought out and the Irish peasants were placed 
in a position where they somehow could buy on installment pay- 
ments that little patch of land they got. The Czar's government 
was too reactionary to offer even such a solution. It stuck 
stubbornly to the old order for years and years. And when the 
day struck, when the peasants were in full physical control of the 
country, it was too late to offer such solutions. The peasants 
needed too much land and the finances of Russia were too dis- 
rupted to allow arrangements which would have been acceptable 
to capitalistic conceptions of society. If the land they took had 
been bought, it would have required tens of billions of roubles, 
financing of a kind which Russia was unable to do, even if she had 
wanted at that time. When the revolution came, the army which 
had been the chief weapon for keeping the peasants down, be- 
came the chief weapon in the hands of the peasants themselves. 

108 



The Soviet Republic 109 

And so the peasants just took the land. Whether you approve of 
it or not, it doesn't matter because you can't change it any more 
than you can change the course of the sun or the moon. It was, 
as diplomats say, a, fait accompli, which could not be undone. 

The Kerensky government fell because it had not courage 
enough to deal with this fact as an accomplished fact. Nor did it 
dare to stand for the consequences of this fact. Yet just naturally 
many other things resulted therefrom. If you annul the property 
rights on millions of acres of land, you thereby strike a death blow 
at the very foundations of capitalistic finance. Land is usually 
mortgaged. The value of papers in banks ultimately rests on land 
value. If you annul the mortgages, the banks are bankrupted. 
The bankruptcy of the banks will influence industrial and com- 
mercial life as a whole. 

There were several theoretically possible courses to take to 
prevent such an outcome. One would have been to suppress 
the peasants. That could not be done because the peasants 
refused to allow themselves to be used to suppress themselves. 
Another proposition — one which is being carried out in Russia 
even now, although with very little success — was to get some- 
body else to suppress the peasants. Kolchak is trying to gather 
around him various armies of semi-savage nomadic tribes, such as 
Kalmyks, Bashkirs, etc., who have no interest in the land ques- 
tion, with a sprinkling of old regime officers. They are, how- 
ever, not numerous enough to suppress that vast number of 
peasants. Then the Russian autocracy proposes another solu- 
tion. They would like to have your boys come over there and 
suppress the Russian peasants. There has been some opposition 
among you to that proposition. 

If there had been no Communist party in Russia at the time of 
the March revolution, one would have been created to cope with the 
issues presented by the nationalization of land. The Bolsheviki 
are in power because they had courage enough to stand by that 
issue and to pursue a policy which was necessary. The fact that 
they, as Socialists, were particularly interested in following such a 
program made them particularly fitted to take upon themselves 
the consequences of the nationalization of land. Those conse- 
quences were the nationalization of banks, industry and so on, as 
far as it has been necessary and advantageous. 



110 The Annals of the American Academy 

It is said that Russia is chaotic. This is true to a certain 
extent, but where do you not have chaos in the world today? 
You have chaos elsewhere than in Russia. Is there more chaos 
in Soviet Russia than there is in the rest of the world? There are 
many conflicting reports upon it. I shall, however, call attention 
to the testimony of a man who cannot be accused of bias toward 
bolshevism, Mr. Allen White, who was selected by the President 
of the United States to be one of the representatives at the Princes 
Island Conference, which never took place. He writes in the 
New York World of April 27, 1919, that the Soviet government of 
Russia is the only stable government on the European Continent 
east of the Rhine. Mr. Fred Hunt, quite a conservative corres- 
pondent of the Chicago Tribune, who is now in Soviet Russia, 
wires to his paper that there is more order in Soviet Russia than 
he has seen for a long time anywhere in Europe. An exaggeration, 
some may say. Perhaps not. The average American public 
have certain notions about the Bolsheviki. They always mix 
anarchy and bolshevism all in one. Now the fact is that the 
Communist party, which is popularly called the Bolshevik party, 
is absolutely anti-anarchistic. 

There is terror in Russia, it is said. Why, yes! But if you 
speak of the Russian Red Terror, which, according to official 
figures has taken by executions — or if you please, murders — 
about 3,000 lives during the past year, why don't you speak about 
other terror that exists in other places? In little Finland alone, 
where I come from, the anti-socialist forces, the so-called White 
Guard together with the Germans, after the civil war was over, 
deliberately executed 15,000 men and women, and deliberately 
starved 10,000 more to death within a period of a few months, and 
they admit it themselves. Kolchak boasts of the fact that, when- 
ever he is able to get hold of a village or a town where the Bolshe- 
viki have been in power, he executes "as bandits" all those who 
belonged to the Soviet government. His forces execute as mur- 
derers and looters all the prisoners they take. 

If the Kolchaks ever will come into power in Russia, they will 
come into power over the bodies, not of three or four or five thou- 
sand, but over the bodies of five, six or seven hundred thousand 
men. You will have an orgy of bloodshed which you never have 
had in the world before. It will mean fighting in each and every 



The Soviet Republic 111 

village in Russia; it will mean fighting in each and every house in 
Russia. Is it not clear that if the Kolchaks are to put down that 
organization of the workingmen which is established there, they 
will have bloodshed for years to come, and when that bloodshed is 
ended they will have, at all events, that which you have there 
today? If you countenance the terror, tenfold much more cruel 
and extensive, which is being perpetrated by the opponents of the 
Bolsheviki, is it not sheer hypocrisy to speak about the terror that 
is perpetrated by the Bolsheviki? Furthermore, out of the 3,000 
persons executed in Soviet Russia during the past year, more than 
50 per cent were executed for looting and for street robbery, for 
thievery, for dishonesty. The rest of them were executed because 
they were found red-handed with arms in their hands trying to 
overthrow the existing government in Russia and to murder their 
officials. 

The Russian Soviet government is absolutely incapable of con- 
structive action, we have been told. This is a question on which 
the American public is not in a position to pass judgment because 
they have been systematically prevented from getting news about 
the constructive work which is being done in Russia. A cor- 
respondent of an important news association, who by no means is 
a socialist, admitted to me himself that he left Russia not because 
the Bolsheviki drove him out, but because it was impossible for 
him to send dispatches, as some outside forces prevented him from 
sending them. He said that 95 per cent of all his telegrams were 
held up, and especially were such telegrams held up which said a 
single word about the constructive work that is being done in 
Russia. You get from Russia news purely of a negative character. 
Now if America were cut away from the rest of the world and 
somebody outside of America would take upon himself to distrib- 
ute through the cables any silly, foolish thing which might have 
been done by some individual, or might not, and news of every- 
thing else were prevented from coming out, what do you think the 
people outside would believe? 

We in Russia are very much in that position. If space allowed, 
I could present official statistics of the industrial departments of 
the Russian Soviet government, which would prove that in spite 
of tremendous obstacles the Russian industries are running and 
that their output has been steadily increasing since April, 1918. 



11^ The Annals oS' the American Academy 

The educational system in Russia has been reorganized on an 
extensive basis, unheard of in Russia before; tens of thousands of 
new schools have been established; and treasures of art and music, 
which never reached the people before, are now at the asking of 
anybody in Russia. 

There is one thing I desire to avoid more than anything else — 
exaggeration. I do not wish to state that in Russia there are 
idealistic conditions. How could there be.^* But I ask if any 
country in the world — excepting perhaps the United States, 
which is economically self-sustaining — if any country were eco- 
nomically cut off from the rest of the world for seventeen months, 
as Russia has been, what would happen to its economic life.'^ 
Russia always depended for imports on abroad. How can she 
be expected, after five years of war and revolution, to have ideal 
economic conditions with the world deliberately keeping away 
from her every screw, every nail, every little cog-wheel of a ma- 
chine, every little thing which every civilized country may need.'' 

I admit, and by admitting it I am expressing thoughts of our 
people in Russia, that the Soviet government can succeed only 
in as far as it is economically sound. We know that we can 
maintain our power and the structure of society which is in Russia 
today only in as far as we are able to deal with the realities of life. 
We are ready to take upon ourselves the responsibility of respon- 
sible relations with other countries. We know that we will not 
succeed unless we can prove that the system we represent in 
Russia, under given conditions, is economically the most efficient. 

We have been accused of attempting to "bribe the American 
business men " by promising them $200,000,000. It has been said 
that we are playing on the avidity of the American business man 
and that some of the American business men have fallen for our 
charms. Now, although I am a bolshevist, I shall not be so 
discourteous toward the American business man. I shall not 
accuse him of individual avidity. Yet I want to state that in 
spite of the vilification directed against us, and in spite of all 
warnings issued, there are more than 1,500 responsible manu- 
facturers in the United States today who have in black and white 
expressed their desire to enter into trade relations with Soviet 
Russia at once without hesitation. I do not ascribe this to their 
avidity. I ascribe it to their common sense. 



The Soviet Republic 113 

You cannot isolate the world in the way it has been isolated up 
to now. You may do so, perhaps, for a year or two, but isolation 
of this kind is a boomerang in the final account. It will hurt you 
as well as it will hurt us. 

There is just one thing we are asking for : Trade relations and 
cessation of intervention. 

It has been said that if the Allied troops were withdrawn from 
Russia there would be a general massacre of all those in favor of 
intervention. This story has been printed hundreds of times, 
but not one of the big American newspapers has ever printed 
the fact that the Russian government has repeatedly offered to 
give absolute amnesty to everyone who has participated in any 
struggle against it. The Russians are not out for scalps for the 
sake of scalps. 

I don't ask you to love us. I don't ask you to do away with 
your prejudices against the theories we represent. Why should I? 
I will not attempt to tell you that we are in accord with your 
ideals. I would be a hypocrite if I did so. We represent there a 
different social order. But it is our business, not yours. 

There is too much insincerity in the world diplomacy today. 
Mr. Lloyd George said, in his speech before the Commons, that 
he never heard about the peace proposition that Lenin had sent 
with Mr. Bullitt from Moscow to Paris. Yet a New York maga- 
zine says that Mr. Lloyd George had lunch with Mr. Bullitt the 
very day after Mr. Bullitt returned from Moscow. Now, Mr. 
Lloyd George was formally right. He never received an oflScial 
presentation of that document. No one came to him, clad in the 
oflScial garb of a diplomatic servant with the usual formula, 
"I hereby have the honor to present to your Excellency this and 
that." Yet he knew all about it. Is it not time to do away with 
that insincere hypocritical structure of diplomatic formalities 
that has been built up during hundreds of years? It may 
be in itself a funny thing, if you have enough sense of humor 
to sense it, but it becomes a criminal tragedy when such formali- 
ties stand in the way of sensible people getting together and talk- 
ing common sense in order to stop murder and starvation. 



The Intelligentzia and the People in the Russian 

Revolution 

By MoissAYE J. Olgin, Ph.D. 

New York 

A TRAGEDY lurked at the bottom of Russian life, a discord 
'^^^ fraught with dangers for the future of the nation. All 
through Russian history, the "plain people" never understood 
the man of education and culture, and he hardly ever succeeded 
in fathoming the "dark" sea of the masses. Both lived side by 
side in the same country; both bore the suffocating burden of a 
monstrously overgrown autocracy; yet through storm and quiet, 
through lean and prosperous years, they remained different 
camps, almost different races: the bdrin and the nardd, the 
"gentleman" and the "black people." 

The Intelligentzia During Czarism 

It was due to the cunning precautions and scrupulous watch- 
fulness of a "scientific" bureaucracy that no coalition between 
the intelligentzia and the people was possible through generations. 
It was a consistent policy in Czar-ridden Russia to keep the peas- 
ants and workingmen away from education and to keep the man 
of knowledge away from the masses of the people. Neither side 
was to blame, yet here they were, separated by insurmountable 
barriers of ideas, conceptions, modes of living, fundamental 
experiences of existence. 

It was the intelligentzia who made supreme efforts to approach 
the people or at least to imbue them with progressive ideas. It 
was a group of thinkers and dreamers, army officers and civilians, 
who on December 14, 1825, started an open army revolt in the 
streets of St. Petersburg in the expectation of finding support 
among the people. It was a host of intellectuals, young men and 
women of the well-to-do class, who early in the 70's of the nine- 
teenth century undertook a crusade "into the heart of the people," 
ready to sacrifice all privileges of birth and education, to live 
with the plain man and to share with him their ideas. It was 
again a well-organized circle of intellectuals who late in the 70's 

114 



The Intelligentzia and the Russian People 115 

and early in the 80's startled Russia with terroristic attempts on 
high Russian dignitaries, including the Czar, in a vain hope thus 
to remove autocratic pressure from the shoulders of the people. 
When a revival of revolutionary activities began in the 90's 
followed by the first signs of a broad mass-movement, we find the 
intelligentzia everywhere — in the factories, in the shops, in the 
villages, in schools — organizing, educating, enlightening, paving 
the way for a conscious systematic revolution of the people. 

The Intelligentzia in 1905-1906 

When the long-coveted mass-movement at last convulsed the 
huge body of Russia in the abortive revolution of 1905-1906, it 
became evident that the intelligentzia had no power to control 
the Russian masses. The peasants in the villages burned and 
looted the landlords' estates — contrary to all advices and appeals 
of the thinking radical leaders. The workingmen in the cities 
started the colossal strikes of 1905, with the crowning unprece- 
dented general strike of October, which was contrary to the expec- 
tations and beyond the regulating influence of the intellectuals 
who formed the various socialist factions. The sea of the people 
was too vast and the moments of contact with the intellectual 
elements far too few and brief to allow for a broad sympathetic 
cooperation between the nardd and the radical man of learning. 
The revolution of 1905-1906 had no leaders. In Petrograd, a 
soviet to conduct the affairs of the revolution was created by the 
imperative need for leadership recognized by the masses. How- 
ever, it was of brief duration and died with the death of the 
revolution. 

The Intelligentzia's Development 

The period following 1905-1906 demonstrated the basic differ- 
ence in the attitude of the intelligentzia and the people toward 
the revolution. The masses needed revolutionary changes to 
remedy elemental economic evils; the intelligentzia expected the 
revolution to create political freedom. The masses could endure 
no longer the archaic land system and arbitrary power of autoc- 
racy; the intelligentzia could live and prosper, both materially 
and spiritually, even under autocratic pressure. The intelligent- 
izia could easily adapt itself to the semi-parliamentary system, 



116 The Annals of the American Academy 

that erude European varnish on the surface of a bhmt unwavering 
tyranny, which prevailed in Russia with the estabhshment of the 
Imperial Duma. The process of adaptation on the part of the 
intelligentzia to the seemingly inevitable order of things was in 
reality very rapid. Even before the last shot of the "punitive 
expeditions" reechoed in the Russian villages, the intelligentzia 
was already disappointed in revolutionary ideas. Even at a time 
when dozens of fighters for freedom were hanged daily before 
dawn, the majority of the former intellectual revolutionists were 
turning to new gods. The intelligentzia had failed to stand by the 
revolution to the very end. It had failed to assume leadership 
in the great mass-upheaval. Now it was reappraising all social 
and spiritual values. At this time certain characteristics of the 
Russian intelligentzia appeared in sharp relief. Highly idealistic, 
but inclined towards doctrinarism; readily inflamed, yet easily 
disillusioned; full of self-sacrificing aspirations, yet lacking in 
vigor and endurance; hating autocracy, yet ready to " settle down " 
for practical work under an autocratic regime; loving "the 
people" with an abstract love, yet principally interested in the 
intelligentzia group; believing in the people, yet convinced beyond 
any doubt that the intelligentzia was destined to lead. And the 
greatest of these is the last because one of the reasons for intel- 
lectual hatred of autocracy was that the intelligentzia was barred 
from leading the nation. 

Both the spiritual and the material aspect of the intelligentzia 
underwent a marked transformation after the abortive revolution. 
Spiritually, the intelligentzia, tired of self-denial, of self-sacrifice, 
of an excessive interest in political formulae, turns towards mys- 
ticism and theosophy, becomes absorbed in the problems of sex, 
gropes for an assertion of man's inner self away from the clatter of 
political events. Materially, the intelligentzia becomes hungry 
for external comfort and success in life. Gone are the days 
when it was deemed unworthy of a "decent man" to lead a 
"bourgeois" existence. Almost legendary appear the times 
when men refused to finish their university studies, eager to work 
in a dark village under the Zemstvo auspices for a miserable salary, 
or in a revolutionary organization with the prospect of impris- 
onment and exile. Men became more "practical " after the strain 
of 1905-1906. 



The Intelligentzia and the Russian People 117 

This coincided with new opportunities offered by the industrial 
development in the twentieth century. Russia was rapidly 
introducing modern capitalism. New banks needed clerks, 
accountants, branch representatives; new factories needed engi- 
neers and other specialists; new stock companies needed hosts of 
intellectual workers. A large part of the intelligentzia, formerly 
leading an ephemeral existence, became absorbed in commercial 
and industrial establishments, became a live factor in the new 
economic order. This in itself had a "sobering" effect on many. 
The idea of a revolution gave way to the hope for peaceful 
evolution. 

Meanwhile What of the People? 

Quite different seems to have been the spiritual and material 
aspects down below, among the huge strata of the plain people. 
There was little comfort for the poor peasant in the fact that 
measures tending to his annihilation bore the stamp of approval 
of the Imperial Duma. It was slight relief to the workingman 
to know that ministers guilty of shooting down hundreds of 
strikers, received a vote of confidence in the Tauric Palace. The 
agrarian situation became even more ruinous for the needy peas- 
ants after Stolypin's agrarian reforms of November 9, 1906. 
The workingmen in the cities were practically outlawed by an 
unscrupulous bureaucracy wreaking vengeance upon its recent 
enemies. There was no calm, no peace, no feeling of security, no 
prospect of a settled existence for the masses. At the same time, 
people were hungrily learning. The revolution had shattered 
the stronghold of censorship. Hundreds of periodicals were cir- 
culated in town and village. Books found their way to the 
remotest hamlets. The younger generation was going to schools 
which were opened everywhere. Many a Zemstvo introduced 
even compulsory education for all children of school age. Polit- 
ical and social ideas were steadily pouring into the minds of the 
people, putting fire to the fuel of discontent. The Imperial Duma, 
powerless and humble as it was in the face of autocracy, had to 
tolerate a left wing that used the high tribunal for nation-wide 
propaganda. Thus, while the intelligentzia was accepting the 
situation as final in its main outlines ; while few believed in a near 
revolution, and fewer were ready to become instrumental in revo- 



118 The Annals of the American Academy 

lutionary movements; while the revolutionary organizations were 
steadily losing their intellectual members and only the most 
stubbornly optimistic remained faithful to the old banners; the 
masses of the people were accumulating the fury of hatred, the 
lava of repressed energy, the poison of corrosive disgust, which 
only wait for an opportunity to burst forth. The general political 
strikes of 1913 and 1914 in the capital and in other industrial 
centers, came as a surprise to intellectual Russia. The gulf 
between the man of culture and the plain people was deeper than 
ever. 

The Intelligentzia, the War and the People 

The war did not bridge the gulf. The intelligentzia saw in 
the world conflict a struggle for democratic principles ; the masses 
saw in it a sacrifice in blood and treasure for things they did not 
understand. The intelligentzia had a vision of a strong powerful 
nation emerging from a victorious peace; the masses had the 
immediate experience of millions dead and wounded, of millions 
of households losing their best working force. The intelligentzia 
rallied to the support of the existing government in the conduct 
of the war, convinced that to win the war was of infinitely more 
importance than to change the form of government; the masses, 
even those plain men who were able to think, were unable to 
understand the possibility of cooperation between progressive 
forces and the government of the Czar. The government in its 
turn exerted every effort to manifest the futility of such coop- 
eration. Inefficiency, vicious recklessness, coupled with an in- 
crease of oppression, marked the conduct of the war by the old 
regime administration. 

The revolution of March, 1917, came not as a result of conscious 
efforts on the part of the thinking elements, but as a spontaneous 
outburst of despair on the part of the masses. Before March, 
1917, the intelligentzia did not expect and did not wish a revolu- 
tion. What it demanded with full vigor was a cabinet appointed 
by the Czar from the majority of the Imperial Duma. When 
the masses went out into the streets of Petrograd clamoring for 
bread and peace, they were not led by intelligentzia organizations. 
When army units, for the first time in Russian history, refused to 
suppress the riots by force of arms, it came as a result of war- 



The Intelligentzia and the Russian People 119 

weariness and general dissatisfaction among the masses, and not 
as a result of systematic propaganda. When councils (soviets) 
of workingmen, soldiers and peasants were formed in every prov- 
ince and district of Russia to represent the plain man, it was not 
the execution of a clearly conceived plan, but an outburst of 
spontaneous activity on the part of the narod. From the very 
first days of the revolution there were two centers of power in 
Russia, two bodies speaking with authority— the provisional 
government supported by the intelligentzia, and the soviet- 
organization supported by the masses. 

Failure of the Provisional Government 

The chasm between them was never spanned. The thinking 
of the masses was elementary and concrete. The peasants wanted 
the land. The provisional government, determined as it was to 
confiscate the land of the nobility and to introduce a radical 
agrarian reform, became entangled in theoretical controversies 
and practical difficulties. Months passed without marked prog- 
ress. The provisional government was well meaning, yet it 
could not win the confidence of the masses who were hungry for 
immediate improvements. The workmen's and soldiers' Soviets 
insisted upon a speedy convocation of the Constituent Assembly. 
The provisional government, hampered by subtleties of electoral 
systems, was losing precious time and evoking unwarranted 
suspicions. The provisional government deemed all internal 
readjustments and improvements secondary to the main issue of 
the time — the continuation of military activities at the front. 
The front loomed in the eyes of the intelligentsia as the object of 
the most generous national sacrifices and as a duty of the Russian 
revolution to civilization. Here it entered into a sharp and irre- 
mediable conflict with the masses. 

The intelligentzia failed to see that war-weariness was the very 
cause of the revolution. It failed to realize that the yearning for 
peace, both at the front and in the rear, was overwhelming. It 
failed to hear the cry of anguish coming from exhausted millions 
who had never seen the glory of an ideal in the war. It overlooked 
the cruel fact that, with the industries of the country rapidly 
collapsing, with transportation deteriorating, with the entire 
economic fabric weakening day after day, there was hardly any 



120 The Annals of the American Academy 

possibility of maintaining millions at the front. The intelligentzia 
remained isolated from the masses. It had no way of meeting 
the implacable realities of a situation. It had assumed leader- 
ship without that closeness to the currents of popular sentiment 
which guarantees success. It lacked the ability of moulding pub- 
lic opinion and wisely directing mass-energy into carefully drawn 
channels. It had not put before the masses a great luminous 
ideal, potent to make them forget pain and cheerfully endure 
privation. The intelligentzia remained what it had been for 
generations: idealistic, impractical, prone to take its own experi- 
ences as the measure of life, convinced of its inborn quality to 
be the leader of man. 

The Coming of the Plain Man 

When that leadership slipped out of the hands of the intelli- 
gentzia, its consternation was not less acute than had been its 
joy over the March revolution. The intelligentzia saw the man 
of the bottom rising, and was appalled. The man was uncouth, 
blunt, unwieldy. He had no manners, and in his rush to quench 
his material and spiritual hunger he broke all laws of politeness. 
He lumbered straight ahead without respect for traditions, for 
rank, for titles. He had a strong iron-clad idea which he proceeded 
immediately to put into operation. Worse than that, he mocked 
at the intelligentzia with its doubts and scruples. The intelli- 
gentzia saw in him the rising Beast of the Apocalypse. The 
intelligentzia had loved "the people"; it had loved its love for 
the people. When the people came, with crude energy, with 
passions, with cruelty and with beauty, the intelligentzia became 
frightened. It is now sending out clarion calls to the rest of 
the world to save it from the Black People, even through blood- 
shed and famine if need be. This is one of the most profound 
tragedies of the Russian revolution. 

History avenges itself. Russia is paying for the sins of autoc- 
racy. The revolution was deprived of the knowledge and 
technical skill accumulated within the intelligentzia. The 
intelligentzia was deprived of an opportunity for inspiring 
constructive work. Can the historic gulf be bridged .f* And if 
so, how soon.'' On the answers to these questions depends much 
in the future of free Russia. 



Economic Force and the Russian Problem 

By Thomas D. Thacher 

Member of the American Red Cross Commission to Russia 

A C CUSTOMED to think in terms of our own political experi- 
'^ *■ ence, we Americans habitually regard all problems of gov- 
ernment as easily solved by the application of American principles. 
We hailed the Russian revolution as a conquest of democracy, 
awaiting with almost childish faith the extension of all the bless- 
ings of our own system to the great people of Russia. Because the 
Russian revolution, controlled— just as our own was — by economic 
and social forces acting and re-acting through local institutions, 
has followed courses defined by actual conditions of life and not 
by American idealism, we, of all people, seem the least capable 
of understanding. Judging the situation by traditional and 
constitutional standards and forgetting that our own government 
was produced by the operation of relentless economic forces, we 
can never understand. Governments cannot exist in theory or 
imagination. They are not founded upon the idealism of other 
lands. They spring from the very lives and aspirations of the 
men and women who compose them. They are brought into 
being by facts and forces which are not to be resisted by phrase 
or propaganda. 

The fall of the Czar in 1917 was the natural result of unrelent- 
ing economic force. European Russia, with a balance of trade 
in excess of $200,000,000 in her favor for the year 1912, after two 
years of war was unable to support her armies or to feed her 
people. As in France, so in Russia the economic factor was the 
primary and direct cause of revolution. All classes being united 
against the Czar, the mass of the Russian people soon made clear 
to their new leaders the demands which they intended that the 
revolution should meet: peace, land, industrial reform — pri- 
marily economic, every one of them. 

In November, 1917, the bolsheviks gained power because these 
economic demands had in no measure been met, nor even an- 
swered. Economic disorganization had progressed. The prob- 
lem of food supply had become worse, instead of better. In the 

121 



122 The Annals of the American Academy 

Moscow conference of August, 1917, Kerensky's minister of 
finance stated with all seriousness that the nation had been 
saved only by the superhuman and self-sacrificing efforts of the 
workers in the government print-shop. There was no objection 
to the form or principles of the Provisional Government. The 
revolution in November, as in March, was economic. 

The primary obligation assumed by the bolsheviks was to 
make peace and to meet these fundamental economic demands. 
For a time at least their promises of peace and economic relief 
were accepted, although under their control economic disorganiza- 
tion and destruction have progressed rapidly and with horrible 
results. Nevertheless, their dominion over not less than 50,000,- 
000 of people is still maintained, and there is little evidence that 
their power has diminished. But, as surely as the tide turns, 
Russia's relief from present suffering will come in the same way 
as that suffering came upon her — ^through the relentless opera- 
tion of economic force acting upon the lives of men and women. 
Lloyd George, the premier of England, said in the House of 
Commons : 

I do not despair of a solution in time. There are factors in the situation 
even now which are promising. Reliable information which we have received 
indicates that whilst the bolsheviki are apparently growing in strength, bolshe- 
vism itself is rapidly on the wane. It is breaking down under the relentless 
pressure of economic facts. 

How may we facilitate the operation of these relentless eco- 
nomic forces.'^ 

By intervention and embargo the allied governments have 
isolated European Russia from trade, commerce and com- 
munication with the rest of the world. They have cut off 
the Siberian grain supply from Petrograd and Moscow and have 
prevented the importation of any of the things which Russia 
needs from the outside world. This has increased economic 
oppression, and one might reason that such treatment would 
hasten the destruction of bolshevik power. It has, however, 
had an exactly opposite effect. It has aroused whatever revolu- 
tionary or national feeling is left in Russian life to support 
leaders who, whatever else may be said, are sincere in their 
opposition to foreign domination. It has at the same time relieved 
these leaders of responsibility for starvation conditions, and has 



Economic Force and the Russian Problem 123 

shifted the burden of this responsibility to the AUies, who are 
blockading the ports of Russia and cutting off Siberian grain from 
Petrograd and Moscow. By intensifying starvation conditions, 
we have placed in the hands of the bolshevik leaders an instrument 
of the most grim and terrible power, the control of an inadequate 
food supply, the power of compelling men to serve in order to 
be fed. 

Is it not, indeed, time that we undertook to say whether or 
not we are charging the bolshevik leaders with things for which 
we ourselves may be in some measure responsible? Certainly 
we cannot hope for any successful Allied policy in Russia 
until we are relieved 'of all such responsibility before the 
Russian people. It should therefore be our aim to place the 
responsibility for the present economic oppression in Russia upon 
the leaders primarily responsible for it. Bolshevism should be 
confronted by the economic necessities of life and compelled 
to assume before the Russian people the obligation of providing 
an economic system under which the people, as the "result of 
their own labors, will be fed and clothed, and free to engage in 
the pursuit of their own happiness. Confronted with this re- 
sponsibility bolshevism will fail, as Lloyd George says, "under 
the relentless pressure of economic facts." We should raise the 
blockade if only to place responsibility where it belongs. 

But, it is asked, how can we help the Russian people so long 
as they are ruled by the bolsheviki.'^ The question assumes 
that we can do nothing. The other night I listened to such 
an objection addressed by a senator of the United States to 
representatives of the great cooperative societies of Russia in 
answer to their earnest plea that the embargo be lifted, so that 
they, with their own money, might purchase and transport 
cargoes to Petrograd for the relief of the people of that city, 
and the regeneration of trade and commerce. The senator was 
answered without hesitation. These societies have been able to 
continue their business under bolshevik rule. They are willing 
to assume the responsibility and the risk of distribution, and, in 
bringing supplies from America, will make clear to whatever 
authorities may be in control in Russia that the first ship will 
be the last ship if distribution is interfered with or prevented. 
Under • such circumstances no government will undertake to 
interfere. 



124 The Annals of the American Academy 

It was upon this very principle that the American Red Cross 
dealt with the soviet authorities and obtained their active cooper- 
ation in the transport and distribution of Red Cross supplies. 
During December, 1917, the people of Roumania were facing a 
severe winter with no adequate supply of winter clothing. This 
situation if neglected threatened to affect the morale of the 
Roumanian army. Ukrainia was in civil war and in actual 
war with the central Russian government. Shipments to Rou- 
mania had to pass through the lines between those two contend- 
ing forces. We organized a shipment of thirty-one cars filled 
with clothing and supplies for the Roumanian people and obtained 
the cooperation and protection of the soviet government by insist- 
ing that the train should go forward as a demonstration that 
American Red Cross supplies could be transported in Russia. 
The entire train proceeded without loss from Petrograd to Yassi 
in Roumania in no longer time than was required for the ordinary 
passenger train to make the journey. 

When our supplies from America arrived at the northern ports 
we were told by everybody who showed any interest that to 
attempt to transport them would undoubtedly result in robbery, 
and might result in murder. They were food supplies passing 
through a country which was bereft of such things. We were 
able to transport without loss from Murmansk to Petrograd three 
full train-loads of supplies and about half a dozen cars from Arch- 
angel. The only protection we had was the protection of the 
soviet government and the name of the American Red Cross, and 
we at no time paid one single copeck for freight nor did we pay 
any bribe to any person anywhere. We took the position that 
we were in Russia to serve the Russian people: that we were not 
inclined to pay for that privilege; and that we were entitled to 
receive the assistance of every one without regard to politics. 
That position was not only recognized by every person along 
the line, but we received the most courteous and favorable con- 
sideration that could have been received in any land. 

These supplies from the northern ports were taken to the city 
of Petrograd. They were stored in a warehouse in a district far 
on the outskirts of that, city, in a neighborhood which included 
some of the poorest elements in the city population, made up of 
people who were enduring serious hardships because they were in 



Economic Force and the Russian Problem 125 

want of the very things that were in that warehouse. That ware- 
house was protected during several months by no more of a force 
than woiild be required to guard any similar warehouse in our 
cities. And there was nothing stolen. 

Through the active aid and cooperation of the local Soviets in 
Petrograd we distributed condensed milk in weekly quantities 
sufficient to feed 25,000 children. There were no substantial 
irregularities. The milk was not consumed by bolsheviks; it was 
distributed to children under the age of three. 

On my way out of Russia I was compelled to remain for about 
three weeks in the northern port of Murmansk. I was there 
when the first company of British marines were landed. They 
were landed upon the invitation of the local soviet, acting upon 
instructions from Petrograd, to cooperate with the Red Guard in 
protecting the Murman railway against White Guard or German 
attack. After this company of marines were landed the British 
admiral fired a salute of seventeen guns to the Russian flag. The 
only flag in evidence was the red flag of the revolution. From 
that day until the day I left, the soviet authorities in Murmansk 
were in daily cooperation with the French and English military 
and naval authorities. There were 500 Czechoslovak troops 
awaiting transportation upon the ship upon which I returned to 
England. They were going to France to fight the Germans. Their 
progress was facilitated not only by the local soviet, but by the 
central soviet government. The local soviet authorities were 
cooperating with the Allies in the protection of supplies at 
Murmansk and at Kandalaxia. 

These and many other instances during the early months of 
1918 convinced us that through economic cooperation it was 
entirely possible to influence and control the use and disposition 
of Russian products, which otherwise would be used by Germany, 
and by restoring economic life to increase the power of Russian 
resistance to German domination. 

As the first step in such a program the American ambassador 
recommended that American railway experts come to Petrograd 
to serve under the bolshevik authorities in the reorganization and 
operation of the Russian railways. This recommendation was 
made after the peace at Brest Litovsk, and when Colonel Robins 
returned to America he carried with him a plan for economic 



126 The Annals of the American Academy 

cooperation prepared by Lenin for presentation to the American 
authorities. The economic pressure at that time was so great 
that it was quite obvious that with American brains, American 
credit and American goods a tremendous influence could have 
been brought to bear upon the entire internal situation. With 
such resources we could have done much to recreate economic 
life, and, in recreating it, could have controlled and influenced the 
entire situation. 

So long as we use military or economic force against Soviet 
Russia we confirm the arguments of the bolshevik leaders based 
upon the theory of the class struggle. Compel these leaders 
to assume the responsibility of doing business with the rest of 
the world and the complete failure of their absurd economic 
theories will be demonstrated before their own people. Russia 
is an economic vacuum. This vacuum will be filled by America 
or by Germany. No process of economic reorganization in 
Russia can even be commenced by the Russian people without the 
products of our industry. The next crop cannot be harvested 
without agricultural machinery and binder twine. We are today 
not only withholding our active assistance, but by the embargo 
have actually prevented such shipments from America. 

Until trade with Russia is restored to its normal courses there 
can be no restoration of the world's economic equilibrium, and 
until that equilibrium is restored we shall hear much of bolshe- 
vism. When it has been restored we shall be able to forget the 
whole nasty business as a horrid dream. You cannot deprive 
humanity of the surplus production of one-seventh of the earth's 
surface and expect normal conditions of life to be restored upon 
the signing of a peace treaty — ^no matter how many weary months 
or how many tedious words are used in its composition. Lloyd 
George says he would rather leave Russia bolshevist than see 
Britain bankrupt, and that remark may be applied to the world 
at large. What the world needs is to get back on the job, and 
that quickly. Restore normal trade conditions and theories of 
government will be compelled to meet the facts of life or get out of 
the road. The first and most vital step is to open up Soviet 
Russia. 



Social Control In Russia Today 

By Colonel Raymond Robins 
Member of the American Red Cross Commission to Russia 

nPHE Russian Revolution was the first fundamental economic 
'^ revolution in the history of the world and the forces that 
sprung from it will be challenging the world, particularly the 
western nations, for years to come. 

I had rather an exceptional opportunity in Russia. For three 
months I worked with the Kerensky government, and knew the 
Minister President, and every member of his Cabinet — some of 
them quite directly and intimately — also several generals. Com- 
mander-in-chief Kornilov, and others in active service on the 
Russian front. After the bolshevik revolution I knew the various 
members of the Council of the Peoples Commissaries, the generals 
in command of soviet forces, and for something like six months I 
met with Lenin and Trotzsky on an average of three times a 
week. Furthermore, for five months of that time I was the unof- 
ficial representative of the American government, so that every 
communication between the soviet power and the American 
government, or vice versa, passed through my hands. 

The 7 Per Cent and the 93 Per Cent Minds 

I want to present in this paper certain ways of arriving at a 
better apprehension upon the Russian situation than seems to me 
to have been always reached. As volumes could be written on 
Russia I shall have to try simply to suggest certain lines of thought. 
First, you will find sincere and honest men, or men who have had 
the reputation of being sincere and honest, absolutely opposite in 
their statements and in their conclusions upon the Russian situa- 
tion. Why does that happen .^^ I undertake to say that the best 
reason for this — there are a number of other reasons — but the 
best reason is the conflict between what I please to call the indoor 
7 per cent palace and tea-table, formal, diplomatic and military 
mind and the outdoor original, extraordinary situation, 93 per 
cent mind of Russia. In the old days of Russia 7 per cent had 
run the show, had been the masters of everything in sight, of 

127 



128 The Annals of the American Academy 

wealth and power and education and property and oflBces and 
honors. They were delightful and agreeable people; they were 
the only persons you needed to know. The formal, diplomatic 
and military groups found their associations there. After this 
7 per cent had been kicked down the back stairs it was still the 
voice that spoke most generally to the formal, diplomatic, military 
and indoor mind of the Allied groups and representatives in Rus- 
sia. I undertake to say that that mind is still persisting and try- 
ing to speak for Russia, and that a very considerable propaganda 
in the capitals of the world — as well as from Petrograd and Mos- 
cow — has sought to influence the opinion of the world adversely to 
the Russian revolution, to the 93 per cent, to the soviet govern- 
ment, to the Bolshevik party, and to the various forces and 
groups that grew out of that revolution. I undertake to say that 
some of those persons are entirely sincere and speak what they 
believe to be true, and some of them are entirely insincere and are 
definite propagandists because they want their privileges and 
poewrs returned to them. But I undertake to say that it is the 
difference between the indoor tea-table and palace mind, the 
7 per cent mind, on the one hand, speaking into the ears of folks in 
the capitals of the world and Russia, and this outdoor, original 
93 per cent fact mind that caused the conflict between the two. 
You can almost always tell whether the speaker addressing you 
has spent most of his time with the 7 per cent or the 93 per cent 
by the nature of the report that he makes on Russia. I wish to 
state frankly that I have spent most of my time with the 93 per 
cent. 

The Economic Paralysis 
I want to mention another fundamental thing, the economic 
paralysis in Russia. It is so easy to write about superficial and 
incidental elements in a great revolution. I yield to no one in 
opposition, resentment, if you will, and eager effort to prevent 
murder or atrocities of any kind. I have had a fairly definite 
record of standing against mob violence where it costs something 
to stand against mob violence. But I do not surrender my intel- 
ligence to the view that seeks out of the inevitable disorder and 
wrong, and brutality and crime that grow out of a vast revolution, 
to reason back into an ordered and normal life, and then out of 
that ordered and normal life make judgment against a revolution- 



Social Control in Russia Today 129 

ary situation. So far as I am familiar with the history of the 
human race, violence and crime and execution after illegal meth- 
ods have not been absent from any revolution. Cromwell was a 
trifle violent in Ireland. There was a little violence used by 
Luther against the Anabaptists and the peasants. We remem- 
ber that there was some violence in France. But I undertake to 
say that when the ultimate judgment is written down, it will be 
recorded that this vast people — 180,000,000 — who have suffered 
unnumbered oppressions through centuries, and who arose and 
in an hour after a long period of enforced ignorance, took the bit 
in their teeth and went wild and brutal and wrong, blinded with 
the unaccustomed light, will be recorded as having been the 
least vindictive and brutal in the history of the great revolutions 
of the human race. 

Underneath the froth, underneath the inevitable incident of 
disorder and revolution, there was a great fact that has been lost 
out of sight by many commentators on Russia, namely, the eco- 
nomic paralysis that swept Russia from the beginning, with in- 
creasing force to the time when Russia went out of the war and 
even to the hour when I left the country. I was forced to consider 
this fact because I was assigned to food and refugees, and in the 
course of my daily work had to get some reason for this economic 
dearth at the front and in the great cities of European Russia. 
In a land that was fabulously rich, that was verily the granary of 
Europe, why should folks be hungry in Petrograd and in Moscow, 
and why should the army be ill-supplied at the front.'' The 
answer runs as follows: When the war broke out in 1914 the 
7 per cent, as from time memorial, were in full possession of all the 
power, all the wealth, and oflSces and honor of the Russian people. 
1 per cent of that 7 per cent had nearly 100 per cent of the big, 
economic, financial and industrial management in their hands — • 
the direction of it, the executive administrative part — and that 
1 per cent of the 7 per cent that had nearly 100 per cent of the eco- 
nomic, financial and industrial management of Russia when the 
war broke out, was nearly 100 per cent German, and it did not 
even claim to be Russian German — it was non-resident German 
in most instances. How did that come about? -r^ i 

The Russian bourgeoisie, the educated, the privileged man or 
woman, is one of the most delightful persons loose on this old 

10 



130 The Annals of the American Academy 

planet. Fifteen or twenty of them sitting and talking at a table 
are, I think, the most agreeable companions and have the widest 
range in conversation I ever had the privilege to mingle with, but 
they are not administrators. The economic and industrial organ- 
ization mind is rare among the educated Russian group. They 
cared for the ballet; they cared for music; they cared for art and 
literature; they cared for the large expansive ideas, and being 
very rich — 250,000 acres being an ordinary estate, and many 
times their estates ran into millions, with great wealth in mineral 
lands and forests, with great power and possessions — they hired 
the nearest competent, executive and industrial mind. That 
nearest mind in Russia, almost without exception, was a well 
trained German or Austrian, educated in Berlin or Vienna, taught 
the Russian language, told the physical story of Russia, and many 
times operating in Russia with a secret subsidy from Berlin for 
the definite purpose of the economic, financial, cultural penetra- 
tion of Russia in the interest of the Central Powers. That had 
been going on for forty years, and in the last twenty years it had 
extensively and intensively developed. Hence when the war 
broke out the economic mind of Russia was German. That 
mind abandoned Russia, that mind went back to Berlin and to 
Vienna, expecting to return on the heels of a victorious army and 
own what it had previously managed. They wrought havoc as 
they went. They set fire to flowing oil wells and turned water on 
coal fields in the mines of the Donetz coal basin. Some of them 
submerged and became secret information agents of the German 
Foreign Office. 

Within four days after the declaration of war in 1914 a partial 
economic paralysis began in the Russian economic system, and 
there was a vacuum at the top where the brain, the organizing 
mind of Russia had existed. That economic paralysis spread 
out over the Russian land, and artery after artery of normal eco- 
nomic life found itself being depleted and finally practically 
paralyzed. The Russian bourgeoisie answered admirably to the 
call of patriotism. Counts and countesses, princes and princesses, 
the wise and learned and beautiful went out in the service of their 
country to do what they could — very much like some of our 
privileged folk in America answered to the call of our country in 
its time of need — but they ^.nswered with insufficient experience 



Social Control in Russia Today 131 

and without the organizing mind as a national genius. The 
result was that while now and again there were those who ren- 
dered splendid service — like that of Prince Lvov who organized the 
Zemptvos and Volasts and the Russian Red Cross with extraor- 
dinary skill — they never caught up with the economic paralysis. 
And, as just a flash to show that what I am stating is true, do you 
remember that the original revolution of March, 1917, was pre- 
ceded by bread riots in Petrograd and Moscow and was really 
precipitated by the economic paralysis and misery in the great 
cities of Russia .5^ Now as soon as the revolution came, all this 
aristocratic help that had come in to fill this vacuum that had 
been left by the retreating Germans, was suspect of the revolu- 
tion. The bourgeoisie, the autocracy, all of the nobles there 
became suspect of the revolution. They were thrown out because 
they had come into the service under the autocracy. 

The Doctrine of Defeatism 

The economic paralysis, the vacuum at the top, extended under 
Kerensky's provisional government and on down to the bolshevik 
revolution. When you get actual history, facts which will ulti- 
mately be written down in spite of individuals or groups and 
prejudiced opinion, it will be found that this economic paralysis 
was at the base of the break-up of the Russian army, was at 
the base of the defeat of the whole national life of Russia, and 
was altogether the center, and, if you will, the hot-bed out of 
which defeatist doctrines and extreme bolshevist doctrines 
were developed. As a matter of fact, in the army and everywhere 
you found the effect of three years of suffering, of hunger, of cold, 
of discouragement and of failure, because the economic base of 
life had in a great measure failed for the vast masses of the Russian 
people. When you found in the barracks a cry for peace that was 
sweeping the army, you found that it was sweeping the army 
something like this: 

" Comrades," said a man in the barracks where I was speaking to soldiers urging 
the Allied cause, "Comrades, we went to fight because the Czar forced us to go 
to fight. You can't blame us for beginning because the whip and sword were 
over us. Why did the Czar want us to fight.? Because he wanted to put the 
Greek Cross over St. Sofia and to get the Dardanelles. Now, we have over- 
thrown our Czar. Why should we keep on fighting? The Germans, comrades, 
in the trenches are fighting us because their Kaiser forces them to fight us, just 



132 The Annals of the American Academy 

as our Czar forced us to fight them. Why should we keep on fighting? If we 
don't fight them they won't fight us. They are going to overcome the Kaiser 
pretty soon, and if we quit fighting them they will have the time for their revolu- 
tion. Comrades, we have been cold and hungry for three years. Four millions 
of our brothers have died or are in prisons in foreign lands. Have you heard, 
comrades, that they are distributing the land back in our Province? If we don't 
go back we won't get ours." 

There was the general doctrine of defeatism throughout the 
army of Russia and it rested back upon the three years of cold, 
hunger, and economic paralysis. I undertake to state that there 
is no possibility of understanding the Russian situation unless you 
get that economic situation; and I want to state also that it will 
point to wise action in relation to Russia at the present time. 

Defeatism in Russia is not a German product. In the Russo- 
Japanese war the Russian generals and Russian members of the 
government under the Czar said that it took two regiments at 
home to keep one regiment fighting in Japan because of the 
revolutionary gospel of defeatism. The late war was a Czar's 
autocratic war and was cursed in the mind of revolutionary Russia 
by the fact that the Czar began Russia's part in the war. The 
war was his war, the war of the autocracy, and, therefore, the 
revolutionary group, who had fought the Czar and the autoc- 
racy and denounced the war as an imperialistic enterprise, when 
they took command of Russia after a successful revolution, found 
it very difficult to say that they were supporting the Allies and 
that the Allies' cause was just. I am simply stating the difficulty 
so that you may see the actual facts in Russia. 

The Soviet Structure of Social Control 

If we are going to think intelligently about Russia, we want to 
separate the Bolshevik party and its formulas from the soviet 
structure of social control. There is in Russia a new binder in the 
national life of the people, so far as the vast mass of peasants and 
workers are concerned and that is the soviet structure of social 
control. I came upon it not because I wanted to, but because I 
had to. The soviet first met me in southern Russia where I was 
dealing with actual tasks of food and refugees, with my pocket 
full of Kerensky credentials. I found that those credentials did 
not amount to very much. I found that the people did not pay 
any attention to them — those who were supposed to be the repre- 



Social Control in Russia Today 133 

sentatives of the provisional government — and they had no power 
to do what they said they would do. I began to find out where 
the power was. I found an old order that had been very power- 
ful; I found the dead carcass, the lifeless remains of genuine power 
— the autocracy, whether you like it or not, had been a real thing. 
The Czar, as head of the Church, and head of the State, and head 
of the Secret Police, and head of the Black Hundred, and head of 
the Cossack Whip and Sword, had exercised genuine, mystical 
and forcible power that ran to the remotest villages of the Russian 
Empire with a real authority. When that power went down, as 
it did in March, 1917, it was a very narrow structure, a very 
highly centralized power, resting largely on mysticism and the 
brutal force of the Cossack Whip and Sword. When that had 
gone the whole thing crumbled utterly and the actual binder in 
Russian hfe passed; it was very much as if the whole nation was 
disintegrated and lying loose out-of-doors. The physical integ- 
rity, as well as the political and moral integrity of the empire had 
for the moment dissolved. The provisional government of Prince 
Lvov and the provisional government of Kerensky were super- 
imposed, paper consent affairs on top of this disorganized mass 
that came from the break-up of the autocracy. Their roots never 
got down into the actual provincial and village life of Russia; 
they never had genuine power, except in Petrograd and Moscow 
and in some barracks where rifles were behind the provisional 
government. At the very hour when Kerensky was supposed to 
be exercising authority over Russia, there were local Soviets in 
various places and they were beginning to be a real power in 
Russia. Those Soviets were the genuine force. For instance, I 
say genuine because when the chairman of the local soviet said, 
"You can get a train," I got the train; and when he said I could 
get six wagons to take grain from the village to the station, I got 
six wagons! In other words, it was a genuine social binder. 
Now, what was this soviet? You hear those who say it was a 
mere workmen's revolutionary council in great cities, and those 
who speak of great cities alone, speak truly. That is true if you 
only look at the cities, but the moment you turn your eye on the 
villages you find an old, historic, democratic social control, known 
as the "village mir" — a sort of town meeting, broader and nar- 
rower than our town meetings — broader in personnel and nar- 



l34 The Annals of the American Academy 

rower in jurisdiction. The personnel consisted of men and women 
with interests in mir lands who sat on equal terms in the village 
mir; their jurisdiction was narrow because they were held to 
communal land questions, roads, to sanitation, and so on, and 
were very limited in power. The Czar and autocracy, afraid of 
the democratic character of the mirs, would not allow them to 
have delegate relationships and kept them within local environ- 
ment. As soon as the autocracy was repudiated, as soon as that 
power of the 7 per cent was lifted by the revolution of March, '17, 
the mirs grew up into district, municipal, provincial Soviets, over 
night as it were. Joining with the Workmen's Councils of the 
great cities they became the all-Russian National Soviet, a genuine 
new revolutionary binder that came out of the past. And this is 
the only genuine binder, in my judgment, that has existed in 
Russia since the autocracy went down. That is the structure of 
the revolutionary government of the mass of Russia. What 
party and what formulas invest that structure is adventitious. 
It might be, as it is today, the Bolshevik party. It might be the 
Menshevik party, or it might be any other party. The machinery 
there is just like our own city councils and our own state legisla- 
tures and our congresses here under our form of government. 
The party that invests it may be Republican, Democratic, or, if 
they get enough votes, Socialist. So you get the difference 
between the Bolshevik party and the actual social control of the 
soviet structure, which is a genuine thing in my judgment and 
the only revolutionary binder in Russia. 

The Spread of Bolshevik Formulas 

Why was it possible for the Bolshevik party formulas to take 
such a sweep in Russia? Why did these formulas have the 
sweep that they actually did have and that they now have in 
Russia? People can lie about it as much as they like, but a nation 
does not risk its life for fourteen months without having some 
reason for it. There is a reason behind the Russian revolution, 
just as there is for Grape Nuts. There is always a reason every- 
where. I prefer to understand the situation rather than to 
denounce it. For sixty years prior to 1914 there had been revolu- 
tionary propaganda, and during that time the structure of the 
Russian despotism had not changed an atom. During those two 



Social Control in Russia Today 135 

generations the structure of every other state in the world had 
modified toward liberalism. Even China awoke after a sleep of 
centuries and modified the structure of her government. Cossack 
Whip and Sword had held Russia static for all this time and every 
liberal development had been suppressed ruthlessly. Every little 
educational society among peasants, like that of Tolstoi's, as soon 
as it was extended, was denounced as revolutionary and the 
leaders imprisoned or killed. Every little economic organization, 
such as the miners' organization in the coke and iron fields, was 
suppressed by military force, and the leaders put in prison. All 
gatherings and meetings for free speech, free press, and general 
discussion of social interests and government were denounced as 
revolutionary and the leaders imprisoned or killed. So for sixty 
years men said over and over again, in cellars and garrets, in 
forests and Siberian prisons, "When we get power we will pass 
this decree and that will settle this ! When we get power we will 
pass that decree and that will settle that!" So there was a defin- 
ite formula, mind you, in revolutionary Russia, and never having 
had a chance to try indoor formulas against outdoor facts, it could 
afford to believe in them. You know there never was a set of 
indoor formulas made in the history of the human race that you 
could take outdoors and work with actual life. The Russian revo- 
lutionary mind had an indoor formula which was generally dis- 
tributed over the conscious mind of the masses of Russia. I 
have stated that 84 per cent of the people in Russia are peasants, 
9 per cent are proletarians (people who work in the factories, mills, 
mines, etc.) and 7 per cent are the privileged class. Some one 
may ask if I believe that 84 per cent, consisting of the peasantry, 
really had these formulas in their minds.'' Now, this is what I 
mean to say: 9 per cent of the proletarians of the Russian 
people are nearly entirely conscious and revolutionary; 40 per 
cent of that 9 per cent retain their connection with villages. 
Twice a year they go back for planting time and harvest. They 
are the traveled persons from the village. They are the wise 
persons, the persons who have been out in the great world and 
when they come back the villagers gather around them and listen 
to their story. They always say that a good time is coming with 
the revolution, and they always repeat over the formulas they 
have heard in the great industrial cities. So throughout Russia in 



136 The Annals of the American Academy 

the actual conscious peasant mind there was an agreement upon 
certain formulas of socialism. Why were those formulas social- 
istic? The Russian mind is a coUectivist's mind and moves out 
on life on coUectivist methods. The people move in villages, not 
as individuals like the Anglo-Saxons. They are coUectivists — 
they move together. That accounts for the coUectivist dogmas. 
Are they materialists? Not at all. They are mystics. They are 
intensely religious. Why then do they take up with a very 
definite and, if you will, brutal materialistic class formula? Let 
me illustrate by a story. I am walking through a portal — it is the 
portal of the most Holy Gate that opens through the wall into 
the Kremlin in the Holy City of Moscow. It is the most holy 
ground in Russia, and a red guard, with bayoneted gun, walks by 
my side. He takes off his cap. I am interested and curious. 
We move on and as we pass an Icon lie stops and kisses it and 
makes the sign of the cross. Here is a member of the Guard who 
is ready to take orders from Lenin and Trotzsky tomorrow. I 
say to him, "Do you believe in God?" "Da," which is yes. 
"Do you believe in Christ?" "Da," which is yes. "Do you 
believe in the Church?" "Net, net" (no, no). "The Church has 
been the spy system of autocracy for two hundred years." And 
it is that fact, that the Greek Catholic Church had been the 
aesthetic and worshiping and musical center, if you will, of the 
7 per cent and yet at the same time had been the spy system of 
autocracy upon the 93 per cent, which accounts for the 93 per 
cent's utterly ruthless dealings with that institution and its utter 
lack of power and authority over the 93 per cent in the hour of 
national strain. A class church is the most effective poison against 
the reality of the Christian doctrine that you can devise. 

Many persons had adopted the formulas who did not believe in 
them. There is a propaganda mind, entirely familiar to intelligent 
people, common in public life and affairs, a propaganda mind that 
claims and promises more than it believes, in the hours of propa- 
ganda. Then in the hours of administrative tasks it seeks to 
relieve itself from the obligations of its past utterance. I suggest 
that the reason that that wonderful and historic character, 
Madame Breshkovsky, lost all power over her own workmen and 
peasants was because she had spent forty years in the villages and 
f9,ctories saying to the villagers, "It is wrong to pay rent to the 



Social Control in Hussia Today 137 

landlords. Wlien the revolution comes you will get the land and 
pay no rent." She would say to the workmen, "Your labors have 
built all these factories. When the revolution comes you will get 
the factories." She would say to the mass meetings of peasants 
and workingmen, "You will run the government." She had 
helped to distribute Russian copies of The Communist Mani- 
festo and translations of Doskopital. She helped in every way 
to create a demand which, when the revolution came, she 
sought to withstand. She sought to withstand it in patriotic and 
noble service, and supported the Allies, and all that was generous 
and fine in her nature resisted this Frankenstein, in a sense, of her 
own building. "The old lady used to say to us that we would 
get the land and the factories, but the old lady is getting old now 
and we can't pay any attention to her," said the peasants and 
workmen of the Soviets. And when Kerensky was overthrown 
she, who when I went into Russia was the most powerful personal- 
ity in the land, was absolutely without anybody to do her defer- 
ence, because having raised up this situation she was no longer 
ready to be its leader in the hour of its power. Let me give one 
more illustration. Twelve years ago while in New York I was 
invited, because I was a social worker and interested in social 
questions, to go down one evening to Greenwich Village, Washing- 
ton Square. I went down there and as I entered the parlor there 
was a very delightful gentleman, just fresh from Harvard, dis- 
canting upon the perfect system of Carl Marx, and showing how 
scientific socialism was the whole answer to the enigma of human 
society. He was presenting class struggle ideal, the materialist's 
conception of society, the iron law of wages, and all that, and he 
had the whole formula in a perfect statement. There were lovely 
Httle girls there, charming persons, fresh from Bryn Mawr and 
Wellesley, holding their hands and listening in great rapture to 
this wonderful proclamation. I lived to see that gentleman 
sitting in a room in the Hotel Europe in Petrograd at an hour 
when he was charged with important public tasks in the strain 
of a great nation, in the strain of his own national life, in the strain 
of the world's fight for liberty, and then his formulas that he had 
spoken for in the ease and comfort of Washington Square came 
down the Nevsky in the form of bearded peasants and hard- 
handed workingmen with bayoneted guns saying, "That which 



138 The Annals of the American Academy 

you taught, we intend to do. We will push out your Kerensky 
and we will push out all of this stuff of support of the Allies. A 
class war is the only war of any interest. The Allies' war is simply 
a competition of capitalism for the markets of the world. We 
know what we are doing. Rouse mit you." Now the only thing 
I was troubled about was that this same gentleman, in the hour 
when his child came forth said, "That ain't socialism. That's 
thieves and murderers and German agents." Yet it was not a 
thing in the world but the revolutionary peasants and working- 
men in Russia coming out with the program of that propaganda 
and trying to do logically and courageously what they believed 
they had a right to do. The fact that it was wrong is an entirely 
different matter. Our own conscious judgment is the only thing 
that determines right or wrong for us in this human world. 

The Question of German Influence 
Were there German agents and German money and propaganda 
in the Bolshevik revolution? Why, of course, there were. No 
intelligent person has denied it. There were German agents in 
the Bolshevik government, but that has been true of every govern- 
ment in Russia for twenty years. There were German agents in 
the autocracy, and they had more influence there than in the 
soviet government. Von Stuermer, a Germanophile, was made 
Premier under the autocracy by the German interest at the Rus- 
sian court, and anybody who knows Russian history knows that 
to be true. In the Kerensky government a minister of his Cabinet 
was removed because he was believed to be a German agent, and 
in the soviet government there were German agents, and there 
was German money in that revolution. I had in my possession 
for about sixty days, part of the Okhrana records, the old secret 
police records — those that were not burned in the old Department 
of Justice in Petrograd, and all the records (not any of them had 
been burned) from the center of the Okhrana in Moscow. I was 
translating them in relation to German agent propaganda in 
Russia. What appeared from the record, and I think will be 
ultimately historically maintained, was that the Germans for at 
least twenty years, and probably longer than that, had kept two 
propaganda groups in Russia and supplied them well with money, 
to represent the German interest and report back to Berlin, 
neither group having anything to do with the other in Russia. 



Social Control in Russia Today 139 

I dealt with the revolutiohary group in the main, because that 
was the group I wanted to be informed upon. For instance, a 
general strike was called in Petrograd and Moscow just before 
mobilization began in 1914. It was suppressed by the Cossack 
Whip and Sword, but it was not suppressed until the secret police 
got documents and testimony that proved that better than a 
million marks had been spent through perfectly honest revolu- 
tionary persons for the purpose of precipitating that strike in the 
interest of Germany before mobilization in 1914. As soon as 
mobilization began they commenced to work with the group that 
operated through the court and the autocracy, and that group 
had, in December, 1916, bought Rasputin — they did not have to 
buy the Czarina. And the two together sought to sweep the 
weak Czar into a separate peace with the Kaiser. Later it was 
thought that the best thing to do was to allow the two groups 
apparently to go to it and let the best man win. The revolution- 
ary group said, "We will bring revolution." The autocratic 
group said, "We will bring a separate peace" — and both were 
allowed to go to it. The revolutionary movement won and the 
Czar was overthrown. As soon as that took place, again the 
German agents in Russia began, one group with the Right and 
one with the Left, one helping the Bolsheviki and saying, "Why 
don't you have a real revolution? Why do you fool away your 
time with Kerensky?" And then saying to the Grand Dukes and 
privileged class through the other group, "You don't want a 
Kerensky revolution. What you want is law and order after the 
fashion of the German power." So they were working both ways, 
and that condition had existed in the Russian situation for many 
years. Were the bolshevik leaders German agents? My judg- 
ment is that Lenin and Trotzsky were convinced international 
socialist revolutionists, and were honest and as free from a direct 
relation with German militarists' propaganda as I am. I regard 
their formulas as economically impossible and morally wrong, 
but I know no reason through that fact why I should slander or 
libel courageous men who fought and risked their lives for their 
formulas every hour for fourteen months. In dealing with them 
at numbers of points at no time in six months did either of them 
ever break his word. At no time did they say they would do a 
thing and not do it. They were able to deliver effective power at 



140 The Annals of the American Academy 

every point. We sent a train of supplies to Jassy in Roumania 
from Russia under bolshevik rifles and frank, that could by no cir- 
cumstances serve the German general staff. We developed actual 
points of contact and of advantage for the Allies. They never 
claimed at any time to be the friends of the established capitalist 
governments, but always to be their enemy and to be engaged, if 
you will, in the world revolution of the proletariat. I never heard 
of any hypocritical pretenses of friendship as regards ultimate 
political purposes. But Lenin and Trotzsky, being competent 
politicians, whatever else they are, saw the economic paralysis, 
and knew that economic support could come alone from one of 
two quarters — either the Central Powers or America. They 
wanted it to come from America because they thought that getting 
it there they would have a chance to fight against German mili- 
tarist autocracy, which threatened them as well as the rest of 
the world. In my judgment, the fact of their world propaganda 
was one thing and the fact of its immediate impact upon Ger- 
many, Bulgaria and Austria was an entirely different thing; and 
in an hour of war you had to deal with the facts that were at hand. 

Attitude of the American Government 

I wish to state that the soviet power sought economic coopera- 
tion with America. Under instructions from the ambassador of 
the United States, I dealt with them for two months, holding out 
to them that, if they would not make a separate peace and if they 
would refuse ratification of that peace when it was forced on them 
by the bayonet, America would give economic and military sup- 
port to the soviet power. I was so instructed in initialed instruc- 
tions from the American ambassador. I am very glad that I 
have those initialed instructions, because memories sometimes fail 
a bit. During all that time there was a definite and understood 
proposition before the soviet government. That proposition 
was accepted by the soviet government in a written statement of 
questions on the fifth of March, 1918, after that government 
had offered to put our officers on the frontier to prevent raw ma- 
terials going to the Central Powers and we had refused, out of 
ignorance of the situation, in my judgment, after they had offered 
to give us the Trans-Siberian Railroad and the railroads of Russia. 
This offer was not only for their own benefit so that we could dis- 



Social Control in Russia Today 141 

tribute food, but also for our benefit so that we could remove 
munitions and supplies from the western frontier, where, if the 
Brest-Litovsk Conference failed, the Germans were sure to get 
them. We had eight weeks in which to work, and then when 
the conference failed and the Germans advanced on all fronts, the 
Germans took hundreds of tons of munitions and supplies — 
twelve inch guns that had never been shot which we could have 
removed, and with which they killed the Allied soldiers in the 
March drive and in the June drive on the western front. That 
was part of the confusion, and the reason of the confusion was 
always this: When the Allied interests would admit that it was 
wise to do this work — evacuating supplies — even if the soviet 
leaders were German agents, were thieves and murderers, they 
would finally say, "But, Robins, if we cooperate with them to do 
this work don't you know in three weeks this government will be 
overthrown and we will be discredited with the new government? 
Don't you know what is coming down from Finland and coming 
up from the Ukraine and coming out of Siberia?" All of that 
came from the tea-table palace talk of the 7 per cent class. How 
many times has the soviet government been overthrown in the 
last fourteen months? Just as often as the indoor mind of Russia 
has cared to peddle its latest tale. It is a great outdoor situation 
at every turn of the road. This particular proposition was pre- 
sented to the American government and to the British govern- 
ment. It was endorsed by the British High Commissioner, Mr. 
Bruce-Lockhart. It was endorsed by the American ambassador, 
David R. Francis. It was endorsed practically by each one of the 
important Allied interests — English and American— in Russia at 
that time. The American government and the English govern- 
ment never responded. I went down to the fourth All-Russian 
Soviet, representing the American ambassador, to wait for word 
from America, and the conference was delayed two days at my 
urgency — ^Lenin being ready to take action (Trotzsky was really 
sulking in Petrograd in those days) and, in the final hour, after 
two days of debate, at a half hour before mid-night I am sitting 
on the steps of the platform, Lenin in a chair at the back of the 
platform motions to me. He says, "What have you heard from 
your government?" I say, "I have heard nothing." I ask him 
what Lockhart has heard from his government? He replies, "I 



142 The Annals of the American Academy 

have heard nothing." Lenin says, "They will not support the 
revolutionary soviet and the peasants and workmen even against 
the Kaiser and they cannot fight alone because of the economic 
condition and military condition in Russia, so I will advocate 
peace." He then stepped forward and spoke for that shameful 
peace, and it was adopted. 

There is a great historic setting here that cannot be dealt with 
in a paper of this length. I have outlined certain things that I 
believe ultimate historic truth will vindicate, and may I add this 
— if I am on the wrong side of the truth of the Russian situation, 
so much the worse for me. The ultimate truth of the Russian 
situation is finally going to be told. It is too significant a chal- 
lenge in the history of the human race not to be thoroughly under- 
stood, and instead of disposing of it as the work of German 
agents, thieves and murderers, it will have to be disposed of on 
the basis of the sincere and courageous men who have risked their 
lives every hour for fourteen months, and who, after they had 
gotten $200,000,000 in gold in the State Banks, instead of going 
when the going was good, preferred to stay and risk their lives. 
It is absurd to esteem and to estimate this tremendous perform- 
ance as though it were entirely a German agent affair. Ulti- 
mately we will get the larger historic truth. 

In conclusion, I would like to submit the following recommenda- 
tions in relation to the Russian situation: 

First: Lift embargo at once on all Russian fronts. 

Second: Enter into direct negotiations for an armistice on all 
fronts where Allied or Czech forces are engaged. 

Third: Insist in armistice negotiations upon general political 
amnesty to be declared and guaranteed by both sides; Allied 
forces to be retained in Russia solely for the purpose of enforcing 
such guarantees and to be used after signing of armistice in reor- 
ganizing and operating Russian railways primarily for transport 
of food supplies throughout Russia. 

Fourth : Send relief through American Red Cross to Petrograd 
and Moscow immediately upon signing of armistice. 

Fifth: Send Commission of Inquiry, with industrial and trade 
experts, to Moscow to ascertain and report on present situation in 
Soviet Russia and best means of bringing social peace, economic 
reorganization and relief to all the people of Russia. 



Social Control in Russia Today 143 

And may I say that there is in Russia the largest unused market 
for secondary production that there is in the world — the largest 
market for the absorption of manufactured product that there is 
lying outdoors and with the largest raw materials to pay for those 
products of any nation in the world. There is a vacuum in the 
economic order in Russia that has come out of the war. A hun- 
dred years of commercial penetration by the Central Powers 
could be beaten now and we could be the most favored of any 
economic and industrial nation in Russia if we would use intelli- 
gence and brains instead of allowing ourselves to be fanned into 
stupid passion about the atrocities and all the shameless talk 
about the nationalization of women that never has been anything 
but cheap, miserable lies of propaganda, from the beginning to 
the end, and was recently withdrawn, even by Harold Williams, 
who believes much that is evil against bolshevism and whose wife 
is Madam Tyrkova, a noble Russian woman. 

What about bolshevism in America? There is a general chal- 
lenge of the institutions of the western world and of the Christian 
conscience in the materialist force control of the Russian mass. 
It is understandable in Russia — it comes out of a past historic 
story, out of brutal autocracy, out of ignorance and out of terrible 
economic misery. It has no place in American institutions and 
absolutely will not grow anywhere in America after discussion 
and fair understanding. But if we refuse to discuss it fairly, refuse 
to understand it, and denounce it for what it is not, creating a false 
sympathy and a false feeling of resentment, for which there is 
absolutely no foundation whatever in the actual facts — it may 
grow in America. If we suppress free speech and suppress the 
free press and do not allow the liberal foundations of this Republic 
to endure, and which are guaranteed in our Constitution, then we 
will create bolshevists in great groups, who will be bolshevists out 
of passion and resentment against what they feel is injustice and 
wrong. If you allow such a development of lawless passion to 
become general as took place in some cities on May Day where 
men ruthlessly beat others because they wore a red tie or because 
they said they were socialists — then we will have bolshevism in 
America. That sort of situation is the very matter of bolshevism 
in this country or any other. We are dealing with a genuinely 
serious theme that needs to be understood and needs to be 



144 The Annals of the American Academy 

dealt with for what it really is and not for what it is not. And 
may I say to you that wherever any group of men or women seek 
to overthrow this government by force or violence, or wherever 
they seek to deprive persons of the rights of persons or property 
by violence or force, they should be suppressed by an unfaltering 
and overwhelming exercise of the force of the public law, and they 
will be so suppressed. There is no city in America that will not 
support a definite use of force within the law against persons who 
seek to violate the public law. But simply to think that the bay- 
onet and bludgeon can answer ideas — that is an old failure in the 
history of the human race. Behind the mass movement in Russia 
is the misery of countless generations, is the hunger for a better 
human life. With a false economy and a false method, in my 
judgment, behind American unrest in certain places there is a 
definite economic wrong and a desire for a better human life — 
and I refer to some non-Union coal mines that I knew pretty well 
a little while ago. They are not so bad now as they were in the 
old days. I refer to the twelve-hour day and the seven-day 
week steel mills. I refer, too, to the sweat shops in the West 
Side of my own city and the East Side of New York. I refer to 
the rotten police courts where justice is a sham and a pretense in 
many of our great cities and where the poor, the least of these, 
invited to our shores are meeting America at America's worst, and 
are beginning to believe the worst about America as a whole. It 
is a very small portion of America that needs remedying, but that 
portion needs it terribly. American intelligence and resource, 
the Christian conscience and the democratic state are adequate 
to meet and answer everyone of the just needs of American life 
within the Constitution and the law. The only answer to the 
desire for a better human life is, in the last analysis, a better human 
life. There is none other answer, and the world is engaged in 
realizing that answer, and all forces of reaction, all who look 
hungrily to the old order, are doomed to disappointment in the 
great movement of the world's life. The German order met ideas 
with force in a very finely disciplined fashion. Bismarck started 
out against the Social Democratic protest against militarism 
with blood and iron, and when he started there were less than 
300,000 voting Social Democrats in Germany and when he fin- 
ished there were 3,000,000 voting Social Democrats in Germany. 



Social Control in Russia Today 145 

The Czar started against ideas with bayonets in the finest organ- 
ization of mere blind force that the world has ever known. He 
had the mystical power of the Black Hundred. He had the 
Okhrana, the secret police, to dog the foot-steps of every suspect. 
He had the Cossack Whip and Sword. He had the power to 
banish to Siberia a hundred over night without trial, and the 
answer to that power, and the answer to that method is 
Nikolai Lenin in the high court of the Czars in the Kremlin and 
Moscow, and Leon Trotzsky in the winter palace of the Czars 
in Petrograd. The question is, will America be as intelligent as 
England in dealing with the forces of unrest, holding firmly to 
law and order and yet daring the adventure of free discussion, on 
which this Republic was founded? We then shall answer with 
the serving church and the serving state and the serving industrial 
order that brings the better human life to more men, women and 
children than is brought elsewhere in all the world — and on that 
sure foundation we can stand and meet the clamor of alien systems 
and bid the distant generations hail. 



11 



Foreword 

By Rt. Hon. James Bryce 

TT is eminently fitting that the great problem of how permanent 
''• peace is to be created and maintained in the world should 
be fully discussed by the American Academy of Political and 
Social Science. It has been occupying many of the best minds 
in England, and even more of such minds in the United 
States; and there is a strong hope here that when the amended 
draft of the Peace Covenant now being prepared by the Confer- 
ence in Paris comes to be published it will be in a form that will 
deserve and receive the approval of the American people. With 
that approval, however, the work of the friends of peace will not 
have ended. Details will have to be filled in. Rules of procedure 
will have to be adopted. In both these departments the public 
opinion of those who have studied the subject in both our coun- 
tries may be and ought to be of high value. When mandates are 
given to and accepted by any powers under the provisions of the 
covenant, the same public opinion must continue to watch the 
manner in which such mandates are carried out, and the way in 
which the supervision to be given by the league is exercised. The 
experiment is novel, and it is difl&cult. 

We must also remember that the frontiers of the new states that 
are being set up, or extended in area in eastern and southeastern 
Europe, and in the Near East, have not yet been drawn. It is of 
the utmost consequence that in drawing these frontiers the princi- 
ples of nationality and self-determination of peoples shall be faith- 
fully observed, for if they be overridden to gratify the wishes of any 
ambitious power, the seeds of future discords and war may be sown. 
Here also there are matters on which public opinion ought to be 
watchful and well informed above all. It is for the friends of peace 
in all countries to strive for the creation of the spirit, in all the 
nations that enter the league, which will inspire and guide those in 
whose hands the direction of its policy will lie, helping them in their 
great task by sympathy and by keeping alive the enlightened pub- 
lic opinion which will aid them in their task. Earnestly do we 
hope that the American people, who have led the way in the pur- 
suit of this high ideal, will not only enter the league but will give 
it that constant and wise support, without which it cannot succeed. 

146 



The Economic Organization of Peace 

By Hon. Samuel J. Graham 
Assistant Attorney General of the United States 

TT is not my purpose to discuss the covenant of the League of 
^ Nations, or the proposed treaty of peace. The people of this 
country demand an insurance policy against war on the lives of 
their men and their property, and the only policy that is offered 
to them is the covenant of the League of Nations. For this 
reason they are for it, and I believe that it will be confirmed 
and established as far as the government of the United States 
is concerned. I wish rather to direct your attention to some 
phases of the organization of peace which are basic — certain 
requisites which are fundamental, even after you have a league 
of nations in operation. 

Each of us must learn something in this world as we go 
along, if the world is to progress. Abraham Lincoln, with his 
uncommon sanity, once said: "I haven't much opinion of a man 
who isn't wiser today than he was yesterday." Some persons 
always advance into the future with their eyes turned back, 
looking for a precedent, and are accustomed to predict, whenever 
a new thing is proposed for the advancement of civilization, that 
if it is tried the world will wake up and find its throat cut. The 
world, however, wakes up, rubs its eyes, stretches itself and goes 
about its business. Civilization is the result of human experience 
and is perfected by human experience. Each generation has a 
certain residuum of clarified experience from which it can draw 
for the future. But in looking back and examining that experi- 
ence, while lessons are to be drawn from it, men must read those 
lessons in the light of present conditions. All forms of govern- 
ment — whether they be monarchies, despotisms or democracies — • 
are but forms of human housekeeping, and these forms vary from 
time to time as conditions in the world change. Conditions are 
constantly changing. The world is always in a flux. There is 
no trick of perpetual motion in government any more than in 
mechanics. We have only to take our own Constitution as an 
example. It has been changed many times — changed by amend- 

147 



148 The Annals of the American Academy 

ments that had they been proposed in the Constitutional Conven- 
tion would not have received one vote, and would have shocked 
and amazed George Washington and his associates; such, for 
instance, as giving the negro the ballot and prohibition. But 
conditions have changed, and all recognize today that in the 
course of the development of society, government and civilization 
these are things that are here to stay and should be. 

In the organization of peace any proposed plan for a league of 
nations is not supposed or intended to be static and unchangeable. 
After a reasonably satisfactory form is secured and agreed upon, 
and the breath of life breathed into it, it will change, as all human 
institutions change. Nothing is easier and more commonplace 
than criticism, nothing more fruitless and confusing than hypo- 
thetical cases based upon imaginary facts. The Ten Command- 
ments and the Sermon on the Mount, if submitted for approval 
today and subjected to tests of hypothetical cases propounded 
by present-day lawyers and statesmen, could be made difficult of 
defense and shrouded with an atmosphere of confusion in the 
minds of many. Had the first paragraph of the Declaration of 
Independence been subjected to the same unfair tests the debate 
might have continued so indefinitely that it would never have 
been adopted. Debate on hypothetical cases is an endless affair, 
and will continue without a satisfactory conclusion as long as a 
mind can be found to produce imaginary facts. The need of the 
hour is to get some form which will reasonably meet the demands 
and aspirations of the people — as was done in the case of our Con- 
stitution — not a form that is going to meet the views of everybody 
in every particular; for that is not possible. 

Alexander Hamilton, when confronted in the Constitutional 
Convention, with the question of whether he should sign and 
support the form of the Constitution which had been agreed upon, 
said in substance that it was far from what he wanted, as the 
members of the Convention well knew, but that he believed it 
was the best that could be gotten at that time, and he would defer 
to the judgment of his associates, being satisfied that it was a 
matter of choice between the establishment of that form of gov- 
ernment and anarchy. Benjamin Franklin took a somewhat 
similar position, although the Constitution was nearer to his 
views than Hamilton's. This is the view we should take of the 



The Economic Organization of Peace 149 

plan of a league of nations proposed by the Peace Conference, 
and which the people of the country, I believe, have made up 
their minds to take. 

I wish to discuss the organization of peace as it is affected by 
national rather than international conditions; and to point out 
certain essential elements in the organization of peace which must 
be considered after the League of Nations has begun to function. 
Much the larger part of government is human. The biggest, the 
most certain and all-encompassing thing in the world is Man, and all 
that is going on in this world, in the final analysis, is but man's 
effort to make a living. All history, whether of economics or 
government or society, is but the story of this effort. All govern- 
ment and all social institutions are but methods which man has 
devised to make a living. It is the human element in government 
that is the important element and that must always be kept in 
mind if any plan of government is to be successful. The Declara- 
tion of Independence was a capital transaction in human affairs. 
It was done "in the course of human events," as it stated. In the 
first words of the first paragraph of the enunciation of the funda- 
mentals of government is the following declaration of basic 
human principles: 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that 
they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among 
these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these 
rights. Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from 
the consent of the governed. 

It dealt not with interests, with states, with caste, with wealth- 
it dealt with the human stuff that to the fullest extent makes up gov- 
ernment. To understand government it is necessary to appreciate 
fully this human element in government, and its significance and 
vital relation to any form of government. Man must have his 
living. All government must rest on the consent of the governed. 
When that is withdrawn the form of government falls. Empires 
have risen and fallen upon the same spot. The sun still shines, the 
fields still produce, the same soil is there, the same waters flow on, 
the same raw materials remain, and yet on those very spots forms 
of government have come and gone. In the tenth century Bul- 
garia controlled the whole of the Balkan peninsula. In the 
fourteenth century little Servia controlled the whole of that penin- 



150 The Annals of the American Academy 

sula from the Danube to the Gulf of Corinth. In the seventeenth 
century Poland was a great nation, repelled the advance of the 
Turks and was thanked by Europe; yet in one century Poland 
was no more. In each of these cases the government had fallen 
into contempt, or had lost the confidence of the governed, thereby 
causing the withdrawal of their consent. In such cases a dispo- 
sition is created not to defend and support the government, but 
to allow it to fall to pieces, or even to destroy it, thereby rendering 
it too weak internally either to hold together or resist external 
attack. To retain the consent of the governed the government 
must create and establish such reasonable living conditions for 
the average man as it was designed to secure. It must provide 
conditions where the average man can live with a fair degree of 
satisfaction, contentment and freedom, otherwise he will withdraw 
his consent. The decay and disappearance of empires has been 
due to political causes — to the failure of the form of government 
to give to man that kind of living which he demands and must 
have. His demands for a better kind of living have broadened 
with the spread of intelligence in the world. Today he is de- 
manding and will have what he knows he has the power to get — 
a kind of living in keeping with the advanced conscience and 
intelligence of the world. 

Whether representative government can, or will, meet this 
demand is the big and all-important question of today for us and 
for the world, since upon it depends the organization of a perma- 
nent peace in the world. 

The importance of this human element in government, as re- 
lated to the internal affairs of the different nations rather than 
their external relations with each other, must be noted. No 
nation today can prevent its domestic affairs from being affected 
by the internal conditions and disorders of other nations. The 
rapid spread of intelligence, the facility and swiftness of commu- 
nication and the easy and general use of propaganda have created 
this situation. The domestic affairs of China react upon us. 
The lava of discontent, as seen in Europe today, will overflow 
any dyke or any wall of nationality that can be erected. The 
only safeguard is to have such a large measure of contentment 
and freedom at home as will be able to resist and throw off this 
poison of discontent from the outside. To have this you must 
provide that the individual man shall be reasonably contented 



The Economic Organization of Peace 15 1 

and satisfied, shall have an opportunity to strive and feel that he 
owns himself before God and his fellow-men. One of the things 
that man must have, if he is going to be contented, is food, a 
reasonable amount of food for himself and his family. If he is 
deprived of food, and hunger is allowed to take possession of him, 
he at once loses that social morality which makes him respect the 
rights of others and in doing so respect himself. If he reaches 
the extreme of hunger he reverts to the state of a savage and an 
animal, and will kill his friend and eat him. This is Nature's 
primal law of self-preservation. Therefore, in order to have 
stable government, conditions must be provided under which 
the average man can live and be reasonably satisfied and free to 
strive and work out his own life. 

The autocratic power of kings and caste has been swept away 
in the world. The peoples of the world are asking whether the 
powers that be are the powers that ought to be. Formerly men 
knew only their wants, their desires and their fears; today they 
know their opportunities and their power. Give the average man 
what is practicable and possible and he is apt to be satisfied; fail 
to give him what is practicable and possible and he will follow any 
agitator who promises him the impracticable and impossible. 

In a paper of this length I cannot go into the details of how and 
by what means government is to give contentment, freedom and 
opportunity to the average man. However, it is certain that he 
must be allowed a reasonable share of the proceeds of industry so 
that he may have a fair amount of food and raiment for himself 
and his family, and some opportunity for recreation and thought. 
Above all, the government must go into the business of providing 
for the health of its citizens. If a man has not health he has not 
anything. He cannot be contented and he cannot strive. He 
cannot enjoy his* surroundings. He has a right to look to his gov- 
ernment to provide healthy, sanitary conditions under which he 
and his family can live, and to protect him and them, against 
contagious diseases and impure water; otherwise he becomes 
discontented, and a prey to the teachings that lead him from the 
paths of order and law. As previously stated, representative 
government is on trial the world over today, and the problem it 
must solve is how to provide contentment and freedom for the 
average man. Unless these are provided there can be no perma- 
nent organization of peace. 



Wanted — A Foreign Trade Policy 
By John Hays Hammond, LL.D. 

Waslungton, D. C. 

A MERICA faces a new era in her national development; her 
■*-^ future holds immeasurable potentialities. At no time in 
the life of the nation has the outlook been brighter. Peace is at 
hand. Prosperity and happiness, on a plane far greater than the 
world has ever before known, may be hers if she will but grasp and 
develop them. The degree of our future success will be measured 
by the degree of our vision and judgment. These blessings are 
not laid before us to take or leave in a casual manner. They are 
dependent upon the faithful fulfilment of well-defined duties. 
The complexities of the problems before us are great, but they are 
not insoluble. Let us view the situation from the standpoint of 
facts and experience, rather than through the spectacles of those 
fascinating optimists who assume that prospects and possession 
are synonymous. If we follow these gentlemen we may forget 
that while America stands inert and undecided every other great 
nation is preparing the quickest and surest method of snatching 
the advantage from her. 

The world war has come to an end, but war for world dominion 
has been started on the ashes of the old system. Let us bear this 
in mind and let us remember that a well-defined national policy is 
as essential to success in the contest for national supremacy as a 
wise military policy was in the war that is happily ended. Failure 
to prepare for the new contest will be little less reprehensible than 
was our failure to prepare for the world war. The problems that 
are presented to us have no counterpart in Europe, Asia, Africa 
or South America. We cannot follow the example of any other 
nation. If we would succeed, we must lead. Our economic 
position is as distinct fundamentally as is our country's position 
geographically. The war has given us an unprecedented handi- 
cap over every other nation in the world. Our foreign commerce 
has jumped by leaps and bounds until we have almost monopo- 
lized the world trade in many lines. It came to us through the 
temporary weakness of our competitors, and not through our own 

152 



Wanted — A Foreign Trade Policy 153 

efforts alone. It is unreasonable to assume that we shall hold all 
of the markets we now control. 

Irrespective of the renewed efforts of our competitors, now 
released from the inexorable demands of war, we may command 
all the foreign markets that we require and are capable of develop- 
ing along healthy lines, if we will but capitalize our inherent poten- 
tials by wise fostering and conservation. No matter what efforts 
our competitors may make we can meet them and beat them if we 
will but protect our incomparable home market while developing 
on sound principles foreign markets which present natural and 
permanent outlets for our surplus products. 

I shall proceed upon what I deem to be an axiom. Our ideal 
foreign policy is one that would give America the greatest degree 
of commercial independence and compel the greatest dependence 
from the rest of the world. In other words, as a great producing 
nation we should develop our foreign trade as an incident to a 
well-defined policy of strengthening our home markets, by 
stabilizing our financial mechanism, conserving our natural 
resources and raising our labor to the highest possible state. 
These are the fundamentals of a permanently successful policy — 
one that will give us an unassailable commercial position. 

In order to realize fully our tremendous potential power, as 
well as the dangers which are ahead of us, it is necessary to review 
the economic history of this country during the last fifteen years. 

America is the only country in the world which possesses, and 
at the same time has developed to the point of availability, the 
greater part of the raw materials essential to her industries. This 
is the cornerstone of our great industrial structure; the basis of 
our economic independence. It must be protected. There must 
be no internationalism in our economic policy ! According to the 
director of the United States Geological Survey, our country con- 
tributed to the world's total in 1913 more than 64 per cent of 
petroleum; 55 per cent of copper; 43 per cent of phosphate; 42 
per cent of sulphur; 38 per cent of coal; 37 per cent of zinc; 35 
per cent of iron; 34 per cent of lead; 30 per cent of silver; 19 per 
cent of gold and 20 per cent of salt. We have timber in abun- 
dance and an adequate supply of agricultural products to make 
us in a great measure independent. With respect to nickel, 
platinum, tin and a few other minerals, there is not much likeli- 



154 The Annals of the Ameeican Academy 

hood of our country being self-supporting. We are deficient in 
potash and certain other minerals essential to our industries, 
but many of them can be supplied by a policy fostering their 
development. Such a policy may, in some instances, be well 
justified apart from economic considerations in view of the pos- 
sible recurrence of conditions similar to those that existed during 
the war. 

In the ten-year period, beginning in 1904, the export value of 
American goods was $18,692,400,442, against an import value of 
$13,826,293,032, showing a surplus in our favor of $4,866,107,410, 
or approximately $500,000,000 per annum. But from this favor- 
able trade balance, between $400,000,000 and $500,000,000 must 
be deducted yearly on account of the so-called "invisible exports," 
the interest and dividends paid by us on $5,000,000,000 of loans 
and securities held by European investors; money spent by 
Americans abroad, remittances made by immigrants and pay- 
ment by American manufacturers and merchants for freight 
shipped in foreign bottoms. 

During this period we were compelled either to provide a fav- 
orable trade balance to the extent of approximately $500,000,000 a 
year to off-set the invisible exports, or to sell additional Amer- 
ican securities to foreign investors. Payment in gold would have 
soon depleted our gold reserve. The financial condition of this 
country at the outbreak of the war was serious, owing to the 
fact that under the present tariff the value of the imports actually 
exceeded that of the exports. Fortunately, the effect of the war 
was to create what was tantamount to a protective tariff by reason 
of the incident restriction of exports to this country from the 
belligerent nations, thus averting a great national calamity, 
financial and industrial. 

It is estimated that, prior to the war, upwards of 90 per cent 
of the products of our national industries were absorbed by our 
own market, and amounted to more than twice the total export 
trade of the world. It is not generally known that New York 
City alone had, before the war, a yearly output of two and one- 
quarter billions of dollars of manufactures, approximately equal 
to the entire export trade of either Great Britain or Germany and 
nearly three times the value of the total imports into South 
America froni all sources. From these considerations, the con- 



Wanted — A Foreign Trade Policy IbH 

elusion would seem irresistible that the keynote of our industrial 
policy should be to preserve unimpaired this incomparable home 
market. Shall we dissipate this tremendous market, or shall we 
maintain it by the protection that can be accomplished through 
tariff legislation wisely administered? This is inherently an 
economic — ^not a political — ^problem. 

It is vital to the industrial peace, social contentment and pros- 
perity of the nation that unemployment of labor be reduced 
to a minimum. This can be effected in a large measure by the 
restriction of immigration and by the development of foreign 
markets to insure uninterrupted operation of our industrial 
plants. The condition of the labor market in the near future is a 
subject upon which authorities disagree. Among the factors 
which will determine this condition are the future position of 
women in industry and the rate of immigration compared with 
that of emigration. Undoubtedly, there will be a large exodus of 
our wage earners to their native lands as soon as conditions admit 
of their departure, and, in all probability, many of these emi- 
grants will not return to America. But, on the other hand, the 
higher wages and better living conditions here, coupled with 
the desire of leaving behind the scene of sad memories, will soon 
attract a large number to America and perhaps far more than 
would off -set the loss through emigration. 

A law restricting immigration should be of short duration and 
subject to suspension by a body of officials to whom Congress 
would delegate the authority. The quality of our immigration 
from all countries would be improved if the work of debarring 
undesirables were carried out abroad before their departure, 
instead of after their arrival here. In other words, the Ellis 
Islands should be established at the points of emigration. The 
number admitted should be based upon the record of naturaliza- 
tion among the various races during the decade previous to the 
war. Preference should be given to those nationalities which have 
evinced a disposition to become naturalized American citizens. 
It would be far better to suffer a temporary shortage of labor 
than to have any considerable oversupply under normal industrial 
conditions. We can dictate the types and numbers of our future 
immigrants. Shall we accept hordes of undesirables, or shall we 
accept the best that apply and in the number required.'^ 



l56 The Annals oJ' the American Academy ' 

After the period of reconstruction in Europe, America cannot 
depend on European markets to absorb her surplus products. If 
England permanently adopts and extends the principle of the 
protective tariff — as she surely will — as a basis of preferential 
tariffs with her colonies and dependencies, America will be de- 
prived of her most important foreign market. In the fiscal year 
ended June 30, 1914, nearly 40 per cent of our total exports were 
to the United Kingdom and Canada. This almost equaled the 
entire importations into South America from all nations. These 
comparative figures are instructive. Germany also will lose her 
best market, for in the year 1913 one-sixth of her entire exports — 
a large part of which were manufactures — went to England, in 
addition to her very considerable export trade with the colonies. 

There is a tendency in this country to overestimate the disa- 
bilities under which the great commercial nations of the world 
will labor as a result of their war losses. Let us examine the 
facts. France unquestionably will require most of her strength 
and capital for some time to come to rebuild her devastated 
areas. Japan undoubtedly will attempt to make great strides in 
South and Central America, and in many lines we cannot hope to 
compete with her underpaid labor. Germany, driven from her 
old markets under the British flag will regain — and in fact already 
is attempting to regain — and enlarge her sphere in Latin America. 
We shall meet her at every turn. Her unscrupulous agents will 
be found in every market and their activities will bear fruit. 
While England has paid a tremendous price to carry on the war, 
it has not all been lost to her. As a result of the war, her indus- 
try has been modernized and she is now far better equipped than 
ever before to compete for world trade. 

It is to the so-called "backward nations" of South America, 
Africa, Asia and to Russia that America must look for her future 
markets. These countries possess enormous natural resources, 
as yet undeveloped, and consequently of no present value. Their 
people lack purchasing-power, and because of the low standards 
of living there is but little demand for foreign goods. The exploi- 
tation of these countries would involve the expenditure of colossal 
sums of money. Where is the money to come from? Obviously 
European financial centers can no longer provide capital, and it 
is to the United States that they must look for financial assistance. 



Wanted — A Foreign Trade Policy 157 

In developing new fields of industrial activity, we shall not only 
create markets for American products but for the exports of 
Europe as well. In that way we shall profit by enhancing the 
value of the European securities which we now hold. Our 
Allies cannot repay these loans in gold — that would be impossible, 
even if it were desirable — and to receive payment in their indus- 
trial products would seriously affect our own industries. There- 
fore they must repay us by securities we help them create. 

Before the war, England, Germany and France were the great 
bankers of the world. Indeed, many of our own most important 
industries were financed by foreign capital. England's invest- 
ments abroad were estimated, in 1914, at upwards of twenty bil- 
lions of dollars from which she derived a yearly income of 
$1,000,000,000. In Latin America alone England has invested 
five billions of dollars. Both England and Germany have en- 
couraged the investment of the capital of their nationals abroad 
in order to control the trade resulting from the industries devel- 
oped. The investment of capital in the development of a country 
is the "open sesame" to trade with that country. 

In international investments, what the borrowing nation re- 
quires is cheap money; what the lending nation demands is good 
security. Under present conditions, good security is what the 
so-called "backward nations" find most diflicult to furnish. 
It is not only that all business arrangements may at any time be 
disrupted by political disturbances, but where a dispute arises 
between the foreign investor and the local interests, the matter is 
decided by a biased local court or by executive decree, from either 
of which the only appeal in practice is to diplomatic intervention. 
Whichever way the case is finally decided, the course of procedure 
creates bad feeling on both sides. For this reason, I advocate the 
creation of a High Court of Equity to hear and determine cases 
solely in the category to which I have referred. 

The authority of such a court would be enormous. Its deci- 
sions, published all over the world, would constitute a powerful 
deterrent to dishonest practice; and its influences would extend 
over the whole field of international business. For the plaintiff 
or defendant, as the case might be, would not be called upon to 
accept the decision of a foreign judge and jury whom he would 
suspect of bias against him. It is not suggested, of course, that 



l58 The Annals of the American Academy 

every dispute should be taken to the High Court of Equity and 
jurisdiction might be fixed by a minimum sum as the amount to 
be involved in the suit. 

If we wish to induce the investment of American money abroad, 
our government must change its attitude towards American in- 
vestors in foreign countries. Heretofore no attempt has been 
made to distinguish between legitimate undertaking by Ameri- 
cans, founded upon the purchase for cash of land, mining-rights, 
etc., and those schemes — ^fortunately few in number — which are 
based entirely upon concessions extorted without valuable con- 
sideration. The view has been that there is something base and 
sordid in any American business enterprise conducted in a foreign 
country. The fact is that the opposition to the legitimate invest- 
ment of American capital abroad usually rests upon the complete 
ignorance of the circumstances. 

Anyone who is familiar with the conditions in Latin America, 
in Africa, in the West Indies, for example, knows that whatever 
measure of prosperity and civilization exists among the natives 
has been developed by the activities of foreign capital in those 
regions. What may very properly be asked of a man who invests 
his capital in a so-called "backward country" is: "Are the inhabi- 
tants of this country better off or worse off because you have gone 
among them to do business?" And by the answer to this ques- 
tion any foreign enterprise should be approved or condemned. 
In modern times there are few instances in which native races 
have not secured great benefits both moral and material from the 
establishment among them of foreign enterprises. 

The foreigner, acting for his own selfish interest, will do every- 
thing he can to maintain law and order and to avert internal 
warfare. He will build hospitals, import physicians and surgeons, 
improve the sanitary conditions, develop means of transportation 
and communication, and encourage local industry. In the actual 
conduct of his business, he will bring capital to the country, give 
employment to labor and elevate the standard of living. Through 
the taxation of his enterprises, the government of the country will 
increase its revenues and find it easier to borrow money for its 
own purposes. The foreign investor invariably pays a higher rate 
of wages than native employers, and his business always stimu- 
lates the development of whatever resources the country pos- 



Wanted — ^A Foreign Trade Policy 159 

sesses. An excellent and typical instance of this is what occurs 
when American capitalists build a smelter in Mexico. The 
smelter will depend upon ore mined by native wage labor, but in 
the surrounding district there will be thousands of acres of metal- 
bearing ground owned in small patches by the natives. Before 
the smelter is built this ground is worth nothing whatever to its 
owners as none of them has the capital with which to erect build- 
ings, to import machinery and to employ mining engineers and 
metallurgists. But the American smelter will buy at a fair price 
all the ore any of these men will bring to it, thus turning into 
money resources which have hitherto been valueless to their pos- 
sessors. Less direct, but no less beneficial, is the stimulus given 
by the smelter to small local industries among the natives like 
farming and cattle-raising. What is true of the Mexican smelter 
built by foreign capital is true of the West Indian sugar factory, 
of the Malayan tin mine, of the African gold mine, of the Bur- 
mese rice mill, of the Sumatra tobacco plantation — the foreign 
investor makes his profit, but in doing so he increases the prosper- 
ity, the development and advancement of the country. In 
addition to this he confers a benefit upon his own country, for he 
establishes a trade connection which may be of great value both 
as to the import and export of commodities and provides freight 
for the railways and the merchant marine of his own nation. 

It would be manifestly impossible to discuss all the phases of 
foreign trade policy in a paper of this scope. I have dwelt only 
on those which I deem to be of major importance. It seems almost 
unnecessary to remind even the most casual observer of the neces- 
sity for improving our financial facilities abroad and of strengthen- 
ing our diplomatic and consular agencies. 

I have emphasized the essentiality of fostering our incompar- 
able home markets as the basis of all our prosperity and the 
natural foundation of a great foreign trade. If we are to build on 
such a foundation then our foreign trade policy should embrace : 

1. A tariff based upon the recommendations of tariff experts to 
protect, our home markets from the dumpings of Europe and 
Asia and also to secure reciprocal trade advantages with other 
countries. 

2. Legislation supplementing the Webb-Pomerene law to pro- 
mote eflSciency in our home industries, by eliminating uneco- 
nomic and unessential features of the Sherman law. 



160 The Annals of the American Academy 

3. The creation of an immigration board which shall regulate 
immigration to meet economic demands. 

4. The development of a great American merchant marine, 
privately owned and privately operated, with such governmental 
assistance as is accorded the nationals of our maritime competitors. 

5. The creation of a High Court of Equity which shall adjudi- 
cate commercial disputes between Americans and the nationals 
of countries in which they invest or seek to invest. 



D 



The Freedom of the Seas 

John H. Latane, Ph.D. 

Johns Hopkins University 

URING the recent war no phrase has been so freely used 
and so imperfectly understood as "the freedom of the 
seas," Germany interpreted it as meaning the overthrow of 
British naval supremacy; Great Britain invoked it against the 
unrestricted use of the submarine by Germany; while the United 
States appealed to it for the protection of American commerce 
against illegal interference by both belligerents. Under these 
circumstances the public was unable to get any very clear concep- 
tion of the meaning of the phrase. Unfortunately, the term has 
been glibly used by writers whose interest in international law 
was first aroused in August, 1914. It is important, therefore, in 
any consideration of the subject, to inquire what the meaning 
of the term was prior to the outbreak of the recent war. 

Definition of Terms 

In arriving at an understanding of the term "freedom of the 
seas," it is necessary to define the term "seas." As used in this 
connection, it means "high seas." This latter term may have 
been adopted as descriptive of the apparent elevation of the sur- 
face of the sea when looked at from the shore. It is undoubtedly 
also connected with the meaning of "high" in the sense of "high" 
way. In the case of United States v. Rogers, decided by the 
Supreme Court in 1893, Mr. Justice Field, speaking for the court, 
said: 

It is to be observed also that the term "high" in one of its significations is 
used to denote that which is common, open, and public. Thus every road or 
way or navigable river which is used freely by the public is a "high" way. So 
a large body of navigable water other than a river, which is of an extent beyond 
the measurement of one's unaided vision, and is open and unconfined, and not 
under the exclusive control of any one nation or people, but is the free highway 
of adjoining nations or people, must fall under the definition of "high seas" 
within the meaning of the statute. 

Since the days of Bynkershoek (1702), it has been generally 
conceded that each nation has a right to exercise jurisdiction over 
13 in 



162 The Annals of the American Acaderiy 

the seas surrounding its territory to the extent of three marine 
miles. Such jurisdiction is not absolutely exclusive, for the 
vessels of other nations have the right of innocent passage through 
this marine belt. At the time that Bynkershoek wrote his book, 
three miles was considered the greatest possible range of cannon, 
but the marine belt having become fixed by common consent, it 
has not been extended with the increased range of modern guns. 
The term "high seas," therefore, embraces all that part of the 
ocean beyond the three mile limit and not subject to the juris- 
diction of any nation. 

The Origin of the Doctrine 

For the modern doctrine of the freedom of the seas, we are 
indebted to Hugo Grotius, whose book entitled Mare Liberum 
was published in 1609. The object of this treatise was to demon- 
strate the right of the Dutch to sail to the East Indies and engage 
in trade there against the exclusive pretensions of the Portuguese, 
which were based on the Papal Bull of 1493 drawing a line through 
the Atlantic and assigning Spain exclusive rights to the west and 
Portugal to the east. The argument of Grotius was both elab- 
orate and lucid. He claimed, first, that the ocean was so vast that 
no nation could effectually appropriate it; and second, that the 
ocean was susceptible of unlimited use and ought, therefore, to 
remain perpetually in the same condition in which it was created 
by nature. He also claimed as an unimpeachable axiom of the 
law of nations that, "Every nation is free to travel to every other 
nation, and to trade with it." It thus appears that the demand 
of land-locked peoples for an outlet to the sea is nothing new. 

The principles laid down by Grotius made a wide appeal, and 
soon became generally accepted, so that the freedom of the seas 
in time of peace (and this, it should be remembered, is what 
Grotius was contending for) has long been established and is not 
now seriously questioned. When, therefore, we speak of the 
freedom of the seas today, we do not mean the freedom of the 
seas in peace — about which there is no controversy — but the 
freedom of the seas in time of war. 

By common consent belligerents have been permitted to exer- 
cise powers on the high seas in time of war which no nation is 
permitted to exercise in time of peace. The recognized rights 



The Freedom of the Seas 163 

of belligerents are as follows: to capture enemy vessels on the 
high seas; to prevent neutrals from trading with the enemy in 
articles contraband of war; to stop all trade with duly blockaded 
ports or coasts of the enemy, and, in order to enforce the above 
rights, to visit and search neutral merchant vessels on the high 
seas. A long controversy was waged in the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries over the question of the right of a bellig- 
erent to remove enemy goods from, a neutral ship. The Dutch 
advanced the doctrine of "free ships, free goods." This con- 
troversy, as well as several others relating to maritime warfare, 
was finally settled by the Declaration of Paris, issued by the 
powers of Europe at the close of the Crimean war in 1856. That 
declaration marked a great advance, but it did not by any means 
establish the freedom of the seas, for serious limitations on the 
rights of neutrals to trade with belligerents were confirmed by it. 
Its provisions were: 

1. Privateering is and remains abolished; 

2. The neutral flag covers enemy's goods, with the exception of contraband of 
war; 

3. Neutral goods, with the exception of contraband of war, are not hable to 
captiure under the enemy's flag; 

4. Blockades, in order to be binding, must be effective — that is t'o say, main- 
tained by a force sufficient really to prevent access to the coast of the enemy. 

The American Doctrine 

The United States was invited to adhere to this declaration, 
but declined for reasons clearly set forth by Secretary Marcy. 
The United States had long stood for the principles contained 
in the second, third and fourth rules, but, as Mr. Marcy stated, 
it was not the policy of the United States to maintain a large 
navy, and we were, therefore, unwilling to agree that privateer- 
ing should be abolished unless the powers of Europe would agree 
to exempt private property from capture in time of war. The 
powers of Europe were unwilling to accept this amendment and, 
consequently, the United States did not become a party to the 
declaration. At the beginning of the Spanish war, we agreed 
with the government of Spain not to engage in privateering, so 
that the question has since been regarded as settled. 

The American conception of the freedom of the seas is closely 
associated with the efforts which we have made since our birth 



164 The Annals of the American Academy 

as a nation to secure the exemption of private property from cap- 
ture at sea, and to limit naval warfare to a conflict between armed 
vessels. In fact, during the negotiations of the treaty of 1783, 
Benjamin Franklin proposed to Richard Oswald an article con- 
taining the following provisions : 

And all merchants or traders with their unarmed vessels employed ia com- 
merce, exchanging the products of different places, and thereby rendering the 
necessaries, conveniences, and comforts of human life more easy to obtain and 
more general, shall be allowed to pass freely, unmolested. And neither of the 
powers parties to this treaty shall grant or issue any commission to any private 
armed vessels empowering them to take or destroy such trading ships or inter- 
rupt such commerce. 

These proposals were not embodied in the treaty with England, 
but they do appear in almost the same words in article 23 of our 
treaty of 1785 with Prussia. 

The United States has persistently advocated the exemption of 
private property from capture on the seas. President Monroe 
stated in his message of December 2, 1823, that instructions had 
been given to United States ministers abroad to propose to the 
governments to which they were accredited "the abolition of 
private war on the sea." President Pierce in his message of De- 
cember 4, 1854, said: 

Should the leading powers of Europe concur in proposing as a rule of inter- 
national law to exempt private property on the ocean from seizure by public 
armed cruisers as well as by privateers, the United States will readily meet them 
upon that broad ground. 

In the war of 1866, Austria, Italy and Prussia agreed to the 
principle of immunity of private property at sea for the period of 
that war. Five years later, the principle was embodied in a 
treaty between the United States and Italy in the following terms : 

The high contracting parties agree that in the unfortunate event of a war 
between them the private property of their respective citizens and subjects, 
with the exception of contraband of war, shall be exempt from capture or seizure 
on the high seas or elsewhere by the armed vessels or by the military forces of 
either party, it being understood that this exemption shaU not extend to vessels 
and their cargoes which may attempt to enter a port blockaded by the naval 
forces of either party. 

In 1904 the Congress of the United States adopted the following 
resolution : 



The Freedom of the Seas 165 

^solved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of 
America in Congress assembled, That it is the sense of the Congress of the United 
States that it is desirable, in the interest of uniformity of action by the maritime 
states of the world in time of war that the President endeavor to bring about an 
understanding among the principal maritime powers with a view of incorporating 
into the permanent law of civilized nations the principle of the exemption of all 
private property at sea, not contraband of war, from capture or destruction by 
belligerents. 

The American delegates at the first Hague Conference in 1899, 
at the second Hague Conference in 1907, and at the London Naval 
Conference of 1908-1909, acting under instructions from their 
government, urged upon the assembled powers the adoption of 
the American doctrine of the immunity of private property on the 
seas. In these various proposals the United States did not, of 
course, include contraband of war or goods bound for a blockaded 
port. 

The American doctrine has always seemed to me to be a de- 
batable question. It has always been based on the assumption 
that private property on land is exempt from capture and destruc- 
tion. This assumption is false. We need only refer in this 
connection to Sherman's march through Georgia and to the pres- 
ent war. An invading army under modern conditions, like an 
army of ants, eats up everything in its path, and consumes what 
it does not wantonly destroy. Private property on land enjoys 
only a theoretical immunity. 

On the other hand, the seizure of private property on the seas 
does not work the same hardship on non-combatants as the 
confiscation of property on land. Modern ships and cargoes are 
usually owned by wealthy corporations and the insurance is 
widely distributed. The loss of such ships and cargoes is, there- 
fore, a national loss, and it is one of the most effective means of 
exerting pressure on an enemy and forcing him to come to terms. 
However this may be, when an American talks about the freedom 
of the seas, he is usually understood to mean the exemption of 
private property from capture in time of war. President Wilson 
undoubtedly has had this in mind in his various statements in 
regard to the freedom of the seas, though in linking the matter 
up with the League of Nations he probably has meant this and 
something more. In the second of his fourteen points occurs the 
following stipulation: "Absolute freedom of navigation upon 



166 The Annals of the American Academy 

the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, 
except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by interna- 
tional action for the enforcement of international covenants." 

The period of the Civil war marked a radical departure from the 
historic attitude of the United States on almost all questions of 
maritime warfare. Prior to that time we had been concerned 
mainly with the defense of neutral rights, but during the Civil 
war the United States pushed belligerent rights to the utmost 
limits. The contraband list was extended; the doctrine of con- 
tinuous voyage was given a new application ; a commercial block- 
ade of the entire Confederate coast was established which in the 
last year of the war became the most rigid "starvation blockade" 
in history; and the British practice of seizing a vessel bound for a 
blockaded port the moment it left its home waters was adopted. 

In applying the doctrine of continuous voyage the United 
States made a most radical departure from the recognized rules of 
international law in seizing cargoes bound for neutral ports 
adjacent to the Confederacy on the ground that they were to be 
reshipped to Confederate ports. The doctrine as previously 
developed by the English Admiralty courts applied only to cases 
where the ship was to continue the voyage to a belligerent port. 
The sole rule for determining the destination of the cargo prior 
to the American Civil war was that the destination of the cargo 
followed the destination of the ship. The American doctrine 
separated vessel and cargo, and held that a vessel might have a 
neutral destination while the cargo might have a belligerent 
destination. The case of the Springbok decided by the United 
States Supreme Court in 1866 affords perhaps the best illustration 
of the extension of the doctrine of continuous voyage. This 
vessel sailed from London in 1862 for Nassau in the Bahamas. 
She was captured before reaching that port and brought into 
New York, where she was libeled as a prize. The district court 
condemned both the vessel and the cargo. The case was appealed 
to the Supreme Court, which affirmed the decree as to the cargo 
but released the vessel. The court thus held that the ultimate 
destination of the cargo rather than the destination of the ship 
determined the liability of the cargo to condemnation. This 
decision was in conflict with the established rule of law that 
neutral property under a neutral flag, while on its way to a neu- 



The Freedom of the Seas 167 

tral port, was not liable to capture or confiscation. Several other 
cases involving the same principle were decided by the Supreme 
Court at the same time. 

The English Interpretation 

This decision of the Supreme Court was very severely criticised 
by English and Continental writers, though, strange to say, the 
British government made no demand for reparation. Great 
Britain, however, continued for some time to hold to the old rule, 
and in the Manual of Naval Prize Law, issued by the Lords 
Commissioners of the Admiralty in 1888, we find the subject 
fully covered in the following paragraphs: 

71. The ostensible destination of the vessel is sometimes a neutral port, while 
she is in reality intended, after touching and even landing and colorably deliv- 
ering over her cargo there, to proceed with the same cargo to an enemy port. 
In such a case the voyage is held to be "contiauous," and the destination is 
held to be hostile throughout. 

72. The destination of the vessel is conclusive as to the destination of the 
goods on board. If, therefore, the destination of the vessel be hostile, then the 
destination of the goods on board should be considered hostile also, notwith- 
standing it may appear from the papers or otherwise that the goods themselves 
are not intended for the hostile port, but are intended either to be forwarded 
beyond it to an ulterior neutral destination, or to be deposited in an intermediate 
neutral port. 

73. On the other hand, if the destination of the vessel be neutral, then the 
destination of the goods on board should be considered neutral, notwithstand- 
ing it may appear from the papers or otherwise that the goods themselves have 
an ulterior hostile destination, to be attained by transshipment, overland 
conveyance, or otherwise. 

A few years later, however, when Great Britain became en- 
gaged in the South African war, she undertook to apply the Amer- 
ican doctrine. The Boer republics had no seaports. The 
principal port of entry for goods bound for the Transvaal was 
Lorenzo Marquez on Delagoa Bay, in Portuguese territory. 
Supplies for the South African belligerents were sent to this port 
and transshipped by rail to the Boer republics. In December, 
1899, and January, 1900, three German vessels were seized by 
British war vessels on the ground of carrying contraband to the 
South African republics. The vessels seized were the Herzog, 
the General and the Bundesrath. The German government at 
once protested, and the British government found some diffi' 



168 The Annals of the American Academy 

culty in reconciling its action with the provisions quoted above 
from the Manual of Naval Prize Law. As, however, the German 
ships were found not to have any contraband aboard, they were 
released with the payment of compensation for the delay, and the 
incident was closed. 

The London Naval Conference of 1908-1909 undertook to settle 
this controversy by a compromise, as the following articles will 
show: 

Art. 30. Absolute contraband is liable to capture if it is shown to be des- 
tined to territory belonging to or occupied by the enemy, or to the armed forces 
of the enemy. It is immaterial whether the carriage of the goods is direct or 
entails either transshipment or transport over land. 

Art. 33. Conditional contraband is liable to captm^e if it is shown that it is 
destined for the use of the armed forces or of a government department of the 
enemy state, unless in this latter case the circumstances show that the articles 
cannot in fact be used for the purposes of the war in progress. 

Art. 35. Conditional contraband is not liable to capture, except when on 
board a vessel bound for territory belonging to or occupied by the enemy, or for 
the armed forces of the enemy, and is not to be discharged at an intervening neu- 
tral port. 

Art. 36. Notwithstanding the provisions of Article 35, if the territory of the 
enemy has no seaboard, conditional contraband is liable to capture if it is shown 
that it has the destination referred to in Article 33. 

A liberal construction of these articles, taken in connection 
with an extension of the contraband list, will be found to justify 
most of the steps taken by England in her "blockade of Ger- 
many." In separating the goods from the ship the United 
States Supreme Court undermined an established rule that was 
simply and easily applied and opened the way for endless conten- 
tion and ingenious argument. In the recent war Great Britain 
carried the doctrine of ultimate destination to its logical limits 
and, furthermore, ignored the distinction which the London 
Naval Conference had draMU between absolute and conditional 
contraband. In answer to the protest of the United States she 
quoted the decisions of the Supreme Court in the Prize Cases of 
1866. Some writers, it is true, claim that the United States 
did not extend the doctrine to conditional contraband. This is 
true, but then it is also true that the court did not have to, for 
in the Civil war cases the entire Confederate coast was blockaded 
and, therefore, non-contraband was liable to seizure, 



The Freedom of the Seas 169 

What Is Contraband? 

One of the greatest difficulties in applying any of the rules of 
maritime warfare is the impossibility of drawing a sharp distinc- 
tion between contraband and non-contraband. Modern warfare 
has become so complex that there are very few articles which are 
not susceptible of military use. It is also difficult to draw any 
sharp distinction between manufactured munitions of war and 
the raw materials of which they are made. A modern industrial 
nation like Germany can manufacture all the military supplies 
she needs provided she can obtain the raw materials. In fact, 
during the greater part of the recent war Germany was better 
equipped for manufacturing munitions than any of her enemies 
or than any of the neutral countries, and she would not have 
objected to the cutting off of the manufactured products provided 
she could have been supplied with the materials she needed. 

We have reached a point where we must either abolish all right 
of blockade, all right to seize contraband, and limit naval opera- 
tions to armed conflicts between men-of-war, or else we must 
surrender all neutral rights of trade in time of war and permit a 
power which has a naval force strong enough to do it, to stop 
absolutely all trade with the enemy. 

The League of Nations and the Freedom of the Seas 

The latter alternative is precisely what is provided for in the 
covenant of the League of Nations in any war between the 
members of the league and a recalcitrant state. Article 16 pro- 
vides : 

Should any member of the league resort to war in disregard of its covenants 
under Article 12, 13 or 15, it shall ipso facto be deemed to have committed an 
act of war against aU other members of the league, which hereby undertake 
immediately to subject it to the severance of all trade or financial relations, the 
prohibition of all intercourse between their nationals and the nationals of the 
covenant-breaking (state) and the prevention of all financial, commercial or 
personal intercourse between the nationals of the covenant-breaking (state) and 
the nationals of any other state, whether a member of the league or not. 

In case the council of the league fails to make a recommenda- 
tion for the settlement of the dispute submitted to it, the parties 
to the dispute will presumably be permitted to fight it out, and 
the constitution of the league makes no provision as to what rules 



llfO The Annals of the American Academy 

shall apply to the conflict. In the absence of any such provi- 
sion, it is presumed that the present rules of maritime warfare 
would apply. But the constitution of the league undoubtedly 
implies some new revision or codification of the rules of interna- 
tional law. If war is to be permitted between members of the 
league, it should be restricted as much as possible, and if third 
parties are to be kept out, existing rules governing maritime war- 
fare will have to be thoroughly revised. In this connection it is 
well to recall again the second one of the fourteen points: "Ab- 
solute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial 
waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed 
in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of 
international covenants." 

If this idea is carried out in a war between the league and a 
recalcitrant member, there will be no neutrals, and the covenant- 
breaking state will be absolutely isolated and interdicted. On 
the other hand, in a war between individual members of the league, 
over a dispute which the council has been unable to settle, the 
neutral members of the league should be permitted to continue 
uninterrupted their commercial relations with the belligerents, 
and there would then be freedom of the seas in war as well as in 
peace. 



The Need of Social Reorganization in America 

By Oswald Garrison Villard 
Editor of The Nation 

^^T^HEN one has just beheld on the other side of the ocean 
^ ^ elemental human forces unleashed; the very deeps of 
society breaking up; the pillars of civilization rocking on their 
bases; whole classes of the citizenship of nations lunging forward 
to take upon themselves the burdens of governing; when one has 
gazed upon a spectacle the like of which no other generation has 
beheld in more than a century, one comes back humble, indeed, 
and more than ever convinced of the fallibility of any single hu- 
man judgment. 

How can anybody just from Germany, France and England 
who has looked beneath the surface undertake to discourse upon 
the "organization of peace"? When I arrived in Paris from 
Berlin, an American statesman asked me, "How can I, Mr. Villard, 
think of the League of Nations, when civilization is all but 
collapsing before our eyes and may yet go down.'^" I not only 
agreed with him; I found he agreed with me that the war which 
was to make the world safe for democracy had thus far only made 
the world less safe for democracy than it had been since democ- 
racies were attempted. 

But the darkness of the skies abroad, of which people in Amer- 
ica are so amazingly unaware, is no reason for failing to take note 
of the portents and to make every possible effort to ward off the 
storm. Here at home reorganization is the great need of the hour. 
All the more so if one believes as I do that the terrible unrest 
abroad and the steady drift towards communism will inevitably 
make itself felt here if prompt steps are not taken to allay the 
prevailing discontent. It has been the fashion in certain quarters 
to dilate upon the wonderful effect of the war in making the whole 
nation one. This is a delusion. Never were the workers as 
unhappy. Never were there larger classes of our citizenship 
filled with bitterness and a feeling of being wronged. May Day 
has borne testimony to that. It is very easy to say when one 
hears that four millions of foreign born Americans are planning 

171 



172 The Annals of the American Academy 

to return to Europe that it is "good riddance of bad rubbish." 
But aside from the economic loss of these people, there is nearly a 
tenth of our citizenship — down-trodden, ill-treated, disfranchised 
and disadvantaged — that cannot emigrate even though it would 
and these are beginning to seethe with unrest and anger. I 
refer, of course, to the colored people, now estimated at ten 
millions, deemed good enough to fight for democracy, but not 
good enough to experience it or to live as part of one. Meek, 
patient and long suffering, these Americans are among the first 
who should be thought of in any plan of organization for peace. 
If we continue to drift without a program for the advancement 
of these people to real democracy, we may be sure that they will 
espouse socialism, or communism, or bolshevism, or anything 
else which will promise them the equality they are denied. 

But my plea is not especially for them or any other class today. 
I heard Secretary Daniels remark truly in Paris that a hundred 
years had elapsed since August 1, 1914, and I took the liberty of 
amending this by saying that a hundred years had passed since 
the armistice. There are pressing such new and diflScult prob- 
lems abroad that the first step toward organization for peace in 
this country ought to be the creation of an absolutely unbiased, 
really representative society or bureau to study what is happening 
abroad and to report thereon in some way to compel the atten- 
tion of the public, the newspapers and the Congress to what is 
going on. Let us take this new-old device of the soviet form of 
government. To suggest that it may perhaps have merit is to 
subject olieself to the charge of being a bolshevist — a word 
which has just taken the place of "pro-German" as an epithet 
in our national vocabulary. Yet the other day one of our own 
American officials at Paris solemnly assured the newspaper men 
that if the soviet type of government were made really represent- 
ative he saw no reason why it should not be as democratic as 
any government, if not more so. It was only to the men who 
were running the present unfair and undemocratic soviet govern- 
ment in Russia that our government objected, he declared. 

Obviously, if this is the case it is time for people everywhere in 
America to take the soviet seriously and to investigate it dis- 
passionately. Personally I feel sure that the soviet has come to 
stay in Europe until it has been thoroughly tried out. While I 



The Need of Social Reorganization in America 173 

was in Germany all political parties agreed that the new German 
constitution now being drafted in Weimar shall contain within it 
the soviet as the unit of local self-government and that it shall 
stop short only of the respective parliaments of the several states 
and of the federal state. I heard everywhere the belief that this 
soviet procedure would be the best device for the reorganization 
of industry. Everyone admitted that that extraordinary de- 
mobilization of the German army — when it came back beaten, 
hungry, bitter at its officers and convinced that it had been lied 
to and tricked — could not have been put through without blood- 
shed or disorder of any kind if it had not been done by the soldiers' 
and workmen's councils which were everywhere formed. I 
met in Berlin the active head of the German Anti-Bolshevist 
Society, Dr. Stadler, and found him a firm believer in the per- 
manence of the soviet in industry and local government, although 
he is fighting bolshevism day and night. Dr. Stadler, like every- 
one else whom I met in Paris, London, Berlin and Bern, agreed 
that Lenin was quite the ablest statesman in Europe today. 

Now, plainly if this German, who saw the forming of Lenin's 
government when a prisoner in Russia, and a leading American 
official in Paris express opinions like these it is time for Americans 
to look into the soviet in a scientific spirit. It would certainly not 
do for us to let the wicked Germans get the advantage of us by 
picking up something good in government and getting the jump 
on the rest of the world. Perhaps we can let them go ahead and 
be our experiment station and discover whether there is anything 
worth while in it or not. But meanwhile we must surely have 
some body or group watching the experiment and passing upon it 
and warning us in time if we are losing a good thing. 

There is something attractive in group representation, which 
is what the soviet is. I was once in a modest way a college teacher 
and I cannot say that the idea of college professors as a group 
having a voice in government is altogether unattractive. I have 
a feeling, moreover, that our great capitalists might like a govern- 
mental device by which their representatives could sit in govern- 
mental bodies with the right to be heard open and above board 
without recourse either to boodle funds or paid lobbyists or 
underhand means of protecting their rights. Please do not mis- 
understand. I am not convinced that we have anything what- 



174 The Annals of the American Academy 

ever to gain from the soviet. I am only a journalist who is trying 
to be open-minded about it and to record the facts of its progress 
or decay, but I am almost ashamed to admit that I am a journal- 
ist, because there has been so much lying in the press about 
Russia and everything that has gone on there. 

It is not only as to Russia that we need information. There is 
revolution going on in England today, peaceable revolution, 
thank fortune, carried on in the good old Anglo-Saxon way with- 
out bloodshed; yet still revolution. I found no Englishman in 
Paris who would deny that it was revolution, or assert that it 
was not going any further. Indeed, in the English Labor Party's 
program, in the recent decision in the case of the coal miners, in 
the almost certain nationalization of the mines, in all these we 
find clear indications of the tremendous change coming over the 
industrial life of England. Change which will be hastened and not 
delayed by the distressing financial situation in which she finds 
herself, and out of which she can hardly extricate herself without 
severest sacrifices unless she deliberately adopts a policy of dis- 
armament and ceases to maintain a large navy and large armies 
to rule over her dependent peoples by force. Whatever policies 
she adopts, she is going to be leading the world in so many ways 
in her social changes that America must be following her with 
profoundest interest and care. It hurts our feelings to hear people 
say abroad that we are at least forty years behind the times in 
America. But this they are saying, and since our daily press 
cannot be relied upon to give us complete and accurate news of 
what is happening, we must find other ways of reorganizing for 
peace by following events abroad with zealous care. 

This is all the more necessary if what has been said so often 
during this war is true — that we have abandoned our isolation 
and are now to be a part, through an alliance with France and our 
partnership in the League of Nations, of all the happenings abroad; 
that, absolutely forgetting the advice of Washington, we are to 
have entangling alliances. We have recently seen how embar- 
rassing it is to be in a war without knowing about the secret 
agreements of our allies. Plainly, if we are to play the old dip- 
lomatic game, we should not do it blindfolded. Let us find a 
way to get all the light we can. 

But most essential of all, if we are going to organize for peace 



The Need of Social Reorganization in America 175 

on any sound basis, is the need for a liberal and a tolerant spirit 
in dealing with the problems before us and with those of our 
fellow-citizens who are so unkind as to have other views than ours 
as to how our America and the world should be reorganized. It 
is not surprising that war-worn Europe should be in the frame of 
mind in which it is now the custom to throw a hand-grenade at 
the fellow one does not like. But we have escaped the real stress 
and strain of war so that it is rather trying to read of the recent 
May Day happenings throughoutthe country. We must surely 
all unite to preach the doctrine that it is utterly wrong to try to 
upset or alter this government by force, however inconsistent this 
may seem with our recent actions. It is a mighty poor American 
and a stupid, dull reformer who lets himself believe that the way 
to get a better country is to organize it by bullets or the cowardly 
infernal machine. That way lies madness, as Bavaria has just 
shown. 

But if we try to suppress with rigid hand those who would 
urge a different form of society; if self -constituted mobs of uni- 
formed men are to become censors of what the dissatisfied may 
or may not say; if we deny the right of free speech, and free 
thought to the dissenters; then we are padlocking the safety valve. 
If we are going to meet them with bitterness and anger, with 
threats of deportation and prison, then shall we merely intensify 
the nation-wide unrest which the war has done so much to increase. 
To let loose an idea upon the world is often a terrible thing, but 
still more terrible is the effort to combat ideas by force and by 
incarceration. The only way that we can organize for peace is 
by setting ourselves rigidly to inquiring what is wrong with us 
and what we can do to better the situation. Let us have a 
national commission of inquiry — not of political back-numbers 
and lawyers and elder statesmen and still elder labor leaders — 
but let us have upon it the spirit of youth and progress, with even 
a non-partisan leaguer and a socialist or two. They usually do 
not bite when in private company and though they have not con- 
verted many of us Americans to their views they sometimes have 
interesting and useful ideas to impart. 

When the red flag waves over the public buildings of two-thirds 
of Europe; when there are twenty-two straight-out socialist repub- 
lics being organized in Germany alone, it is surely time to examine 



l76 The Annals oiF the American Academy 

into this strange doctrine which numbers its followers by the 
hundred millions between Siberia and Paris. Americans ought 
surely not to disregard the fact that the conservatives in Germany 
and Russia today are now the majority socialists who at the 
outbreak of the war were the extreme radicals. We must like- 
wise not overlook the truth that our two great political parties 
are today the most conservative parties in the western world, 
and that they are even further to the right than the professed 
British Tories. There is, therefore, no political alternative for those 
whose desires are unexpressed than to go to the Socialists. If we 
undertake to organize wisely for peace we shall lend all possible 
aid to a liberal party which shall take middle ground, else shall 
we see the cleft and the bitter feeling of the hour grow. In Eng- 
land the Labor Party points the way. Perhaps our own new-born 
Labor Party, if it does not confine itself merely to those who hold 
union cards, can supply the crying need. 

Whether it does or does not, one thing is certain, the move- 
ment to the left in America is coming. No one can study condi- 
tions abroad and rest assured that America can remain apart from 
the imponderable world currents and keep unchanged the old 
America so many of us liked so well, loved so profoundly. Shall 
we guide it and direct it into wise channels by ascertaining and 
removing the causes of social and economic discontent, or shall 
we combat it by force and repression and lynching — and thereby 
compel it to nihilism and to what people consider bolshevism? 
That is the fundamental question to be answered before there 
can be any wise organizing for peace. 



The Amended Covenant of the League of 

Nations 

By Thomas Raeburn White, Esq. 

Philadelpkia 

^I^HE "Amended Covenant of the League of Nations" having 
■^ been adopted by the Paris Conference, the question is now 
before the American people whether it shall be adopted or rejected 
by them. Most of the objections, based upon mere form, have 
now been removed. It is still contended, however, that if the 
United States should join the league it would thereby become sub- 
ject to the control of the organs of the league and would find its 
freedom of action restricted in a manner unfavorable to its best 
interests. It is even argued that our national safety and inde- 
pendence would be endangered. These objections have been 
advanced by men whose opinion is entitled to weight and they 
deserve serious and thoughtful consideration. 

It is necessary to consider the exact nature of the proposals 
which the league covenant makes in order to ascertain how far 
they are likely to improve international relations and to what 
extent the objections advanced may be just. The league covenant 
contains so many separate articles framed in technical language 
that it is confusing to consider it article by article; it will be much 
simpler to consider the proposals, stated rather as objects of the 
covenant. Having regard to the restraint or compulsion imposed 
upon the members of the league, the basis of the objections now 
urged, the proposals of the covenant may be divided into two 
classes : First, those whereby a nation binds itself to do or not do 
certain specified things, either absolutely or under certain con- 
tingencies; second, those whereby a nation agrees to be bound by 
the action of an institution set up by the league. 

Those provisions of the covenant merely offering opportunity 
to league members to take voluntary action along certain lines, 
but without compulsion or relating to matters to be hereafter 
dealt with by the league, are not discussed, as not open to the 
objections now under consideration. 

13 177 



178 The Annals of the American Academy 

I. Obligations Imposed Upon League Members by the 

Binding Force of the Covenant 

a. Enforced Examination of International Disputes and Delay 

before Commencing Hostilities 

Many of the terms of the covenant relate to one great purpose 
— to compel nations before commencing war against each other 
to submit the cause at issue to the examination of an international 
court or council, as the case may be, and to delay hostilities at 
least three months after the decision has been rendered. 

This obligation, imposed upon all members of the league by 
the binding force of the treaty, is entirely apart from any duty to 
obey the decree of a court or the recommendation of a council — a 
matter to be separately considered. The requirement of an 
examination of the dispute and the enforcement of a delay which 
altogether would not be less than nine months after the public 
statement of the case to court or council would be almost certain 
to prevent war in most cases. The examination of facts clears 
away misunderstandings, discloses the falsity of claims made 
without foundation, and lays bare the hypocrisy of states masking 
aggressive aims under pretended grievances. Even more impor- 
tant is the necessary delay after the case has been stated to the 
world. The delay gives time for the passions to cool, for the 
cost to be counted and for that element of the community opposed 
to the war to make its influence felt. Time always makes for 
peace; it is the great pacificator, as well as the great healer. It 
has been said, and truly, that if but a few days had been given for 
discussion, after the opening scenes of the late war, it probably 
would have been averted altogether. It is as near a certainty as 
human intelligence can foresee, that, if the provisions of the 
covenant on this point are enforced as written in the treaty, the 
probability of war will be much diminished. 

This is admitted by the opponents of the league, but objections 
have been heard to the method of enforcement. It is recognized 
that in order that the treaty may be of binding effect, all members 
of the league must agree to enforce it. It is objected, however, 
that the treaty would bind the United States to send its armies 
abroad, even if the cause they were summoned to support was not 
a just one; that the United States would be obliged to fight but 
could not decide for itself upon which side. 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 179 

If a nation should violate this covenant and attempt to use 
violence in the furtherance of its own ends, without submitting 
its cause to court or council, as provided by the treaty, there 
could be but one side. The use of violence under these circum- 
stances would not only be a gross violation of a solemn obligation 
— it would be a disturbance of the peace of the world, which the 
United States, as well as all other nations, would be bound to 
condemn and oppose. But although a term in the treaty obligat- 
ing the United States to send troops for such a purpose might 
well be defended, there is no such obligation in the treaty. The 
stipulations regarding this matter are contained in Article XVI. 
The members of the league agree, in the event of such violation, 
immediately to subject the offending state 

to the severance of all trade or financial relations, the prohibition of all inter- 
course between their nationals and the nationals of the covenant-breaking state 
and the prevention of all financial, commercial or personal intercourse between 
the nationals of the covenant-breaking state and the nationals of any other 
state, whether a member of the league or not. 

This is the extent of the absolute undertaking of any member 
of the league. It agrees to treat the offending state as an outlaw, 
so far as commercial or social intercourse with it is concerned; it 
does not agree to take up arms against it. The article, however, 
proceeds : 

It shall be the duty of the council in such case to recommend what effective 
military or naval force the members of the league shall severally contribute to 
the armed forces to be used to protect the covenants of the league. 

This is no more than a provision for a recommendation by the 
council. The members of the league do not agree to furnish the 
armed forces recommended or any armed forces for the purpose of 
subduing the offending state. It is probable that such forces 
would be furnished by the United States, but Congress would 
have to decide in favor of it before it could be done; and, if not 
done, it would be no violation of the treaty. It is therefore 
apparent that the supposed obligation to furnish troops regardless; 
of the character of the controversy does not in fact exist. 

There is nothing new in the character of restraint voluntarily 
submitted to by the United States under these terms of the 
covenant. It is our settled practice to make treaties with other 
nations, agreeing to submit disputes to examination and decision 



180 The Annals of the American Academy 

and to allow a specified time to elapse before hostilities are begun. 
To enter into a general treaty of that character with substantially 
all the other nations of the earth would be no departure from this 
practice, but a continuance of it. In so doing, the United States 
should be willing to assume its full share of the burden of enforcing 
the treaty. However, the obligation to do so under the terms of 
this covenant, goes no further than to require the exercise of 
what is commonly called economic pressure, and calls only for the 
use of troops or ships of war as a result of the recommendation — 
not the command — of the council, and only in case the properly 
constituted authorities of the United States so decide. 

b. Limitation of Armaments 

Another obligation which the members of the league enter into 
by the terms of the treaty relates to the limitation of armaments. 
It is recognized that the burden of maintaining great armies and 
navies, which has rested so heavily upon Europe, is not only an 
unnecessary and gross imposition upon the people, but that "the 
maintenance of peace will require the reduction of national 
armaments to the lowest point consistent with national safety." 

The members of the league agree to disclose to each other the 
condition of their industries which are capable of being adapted 
to war-like purposes, and the scale of their armaments. They 
agree that there shall be full and frank interchange of information 
as to their military and naval programs. There is no restriction 
upon the members of the league as to the size of their armaments 
until after they have themselves agreed to the restriction. The 
council is to determine what military equipment and armament 
is fair and reasonable for each nation. This determination, how- 
ever, is not binding upon any state unless and until the state 
accepts it by its own free act. Thereafter, not on account of any 
action of the council, but by the express terms of the treaty, the 
state agrees not to overstep the limits which it has itself accepted. 

These provisions are so reasonable and lend themselves so 
plainly to the preservation of peace, that no opponent of the 
league has come forward to object to them. 

c. Publicity of Treaties 
Another provision by which the members of the league are 
bound is that tbey will make their treaties with one another 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 181 

public; and that no such treaty or international engagement shall 
be binding unless registered in the manner provided by the league, 
so as to become public property. 

This provision cannot fail to have a beneficial effect upon the 
relations existing between states. Secret treaties have been at 
the bottom of many wars. And while secret agreements cannot, 
perhaps, be prevented by this term of the covenant, the very 
fact that they are declared to be not binding will deprive them of 
much of their injurious effect upon international politics. 

d. Guaranty of Territorial Integrity and Political Independence 

Article X of the covenant, which has raised so much contro- 
versy, provides that the members of the league 

undertake to respect and preserve as against external aggression the territorial 
integrity and existing political independence of aU states, members of the 
league. In case of any such aggression or in case of any threat or danger of any 
such aggression, the council shaU advise upon the means by which the obliga- 
tion shall be fulfilled. 

Several serious objections have been advanced against this 
article. Perhaps the most serious is that a positive obligation by 
the United States to protect the territorial integrity of a member 
of the league against external aggression obligates the United 
States to defend by force of arms any such aggression against 
that state. This, it is said, would have the effect of compelling 
the United States to send troops abroad in obedience to the 
treaty on all such occasions and whether it believed the cause of 
the attacking state to be just or unjust. 

It has been suggested in reply that the effect of this clause of 
the treaty is no more than to reenforce the provision of Article 
XVI — that members of the league will oppose by economic pres- 
sure, and, if they so decide, by armed force, a state which has 
refused to submit its case to court or council. This is not quite 
accurate, however, as a case might arise in which a state had sub- 
mitted the dispute to court or council, had given the requisite 
delay, and still insisted upon proceeding with a war which would 
violate the political independence or territorial integrity of a 
member of the league. It might do this under circumstances 
which would not be a violation of the covenant (as where there 
was no unanimous recommendation of the council) and, there- 



18^ The Annals of the American Academy 

fore, the members of the league would not be bound to oppose 
it under Article XVI. They might, however, be called in under 
Article X to defend the state attacked because its territorial in- 
tegrity or political independence was threatened. 

It has also been objected that the apparent effect of Article X 
would be to maintain permanently the political organization of 
the world in the way it is fixed at the conclusion of this war, 
which is an impossibility. Nations live and die like human 
beings; they have their beginnings, their periods of greatest 
prosperity, and their periods of decline. In all human proba- 
bility nations will rise and fall in the future as they have in the 
past. This necessarily means that political control of territory 
will change, and in some cases political entities will cease to 
exist. 

It is apparent on examination that Article X rises like a lone 
peak above the other provisions of this covenant. It is in effect 
an absolute prohibition of war for territory or for the destruction 
of a political entity. It would be only a short step beyond this i;o 
forbid war altogether for any purpose, and require all states to use 
legal methods in acquiring objects which they may have in view. 
That this principle will sometime be established is a certainty. 
It is, however, a serious question whether it can precede the estab- 
lishment of an international court and the acceptance of the 
principles of international law as governing relations between 
states. Before a prohibition of war for these or any specified 
objects can be made effective, there must be in actual operation 
another and better means of adjusting international differences. 
You cannot prohibit change by law. You can require change to 
take place only in accordance with certain rules or principles, but 
these principles must be recognized as applying in such cases and 
competent tribunals must be in existence ready to enforce them 
before all other means of change can be effectively forbidden. 
When an international court has become well established and has 
demonstrated its ability to decide international questions judi- 
cially — and not merely by way of compromise — and when the 
principles of international law are better settled and are recog- 
nized as really having the force of law, a prohibition of war will 
be more likely to be effective. Until that time such a prohibition 
as is contained in this guarantee of territorial integrity and po- 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 183 

litical independence of the members of the league must be con- 
sidered somewhat as a temporary provision intended to preserve 
existing conditions for a limited time only. It was no doubt in 
recognition of these facts and mainly on account of Article X that 
the provision was inserted enabling a state to withdraw from its 
obligations upon giving two years' notice. 

It would clearly be appropriate as a part of the treaty of peace 
for the signatories to guarantee the boundaries fixed by the 
treaty for at least a temporary period; such guarantees to be en- 
forced by the states in the best position to do so. It might have 
been better if Article X had been inserted in the treaty of peace, 
but in view of the possibility of amendment and the oppor- 
tunity to withdraw on two years' notice, its inclusion in the 
covenant is not sufficient ground for rejecting it. The treaty of 
peace and the covenant will be adhered to by the same nations in 
the first instance, and after all, it is not a vital objection that this 
guarantee is included in the one rather than in the other. 

Moreover, it should not be overlooked that the covenant con- 
templates the establishment of an international court and that 
the assembly will be competent to deal with questions of inter- 
national law. It is, therefore, not too much to hope that when the 
new system is placed in operation, prompt steps may be taken to 
establish an international court and to develop international law, 
so that within the course of a few years machinery will exist cap- 
able of dealing with disputes between nations involving questions 
of territorial integrity or political independence. Thereafter the 
inclusion of Article X as a permanent obligation in the covenant 
for a league of nations will be no longer objectionable. 

II. Compulsion or Restraint of League Members Through 
THE Action of International Institutions 

a. Decisions of an International Court 
Although it goes beyond existing practice in some particulars, 
the covenant is far behind in the matter of the judicial settle- 
ment of international disputes. This matter has been especially 
pointed out by Senator Root. The United States has so fre- 
quently submitted questions of great importance to the decision 
of international tribunals, that it has become our usual practice. 
We have not only submitted questions of minor importance, but 



184 The Annals of the American Academy 

many which were distinctly of major importance, involving 
questions of the ctass commonly described as those which concern 
the honor, the vital interests or the independence of states. 
Among such may be mentioned the Geneva Arbitration over the 
Alabama claims, the numerous boundary disputes between the 
United States and Great Britain — especially in connection with 
the Canadian boundary — and the Fisheries Cases. The United 
States now has many treaties with other nations providing for the 
submission of questions arising between them to judicial exami- 
nation and decision. 

Not only the United States, but other nations have made 
great progress in the same direction. At the first Hague Con- 
ference the principal nations of the world agreed upon the estab- 
lishment of a permanent international court of arbitration, which 
has done useful service. At the second Hague Conference, held 
in 1907, substantially all the civilized powers of the world agreed 
upon the constitution of an international court, designated the 
International Court of Arbitral Justice, and the only reason it 
was not then established was because an agreement could not be 
reached as to the method of appointing judges. Subsequently 
progress was made toward the establishment of an international 
prize court, although it never actually came into operation. 

This shows the trend of modern thought toward the inevitable 
conclusion that questions arising between independent nations 
should be decided according to principles of right and justice 
rather than by violence. Experience has demonstrated that 
there is no insuperable bar to the judicial decision of such ques- 
tions, even though involving what has been termed the honor 
and the vital interests of the contending powers. 

With this history it was to have been supposed that the cove- 
nant establishing a league of nations would have provided specif- 
ically for the establishment of an international court (which had 
already been agreed upon in form by all the nations of the world) 
and would further have provided means whereby nations would 
be required to submit disputes — if not all, certainly all those of a 
justiciable character — to such court for decision. The pro- 
visions of the covenant, however, in this regard are very disap- 
pointing. No court is provided for. Article XIV states that 
the council shall formulate plans for the establishment of such a 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 185 

court, but that is by no means so advanced a step as was taken 
by the second Hague Conference twelve years ago. It is further 
provided that: 

The higli contracting parties agree that whenever any dispute or diflSculty 
shall arise between them, which they recognize to be suitable for submission to 
arbitration and which cannot be satisfactorily settled by diplomacy, they will 
submit the whole matter to arbitration. 

This provision, however, when analyzed, is seen to amount to 
very little. The only questions which the league members agree 
to submit to arbitration are those "which they recognize to be 
suitable" for such submission. The covenant is somewhat 
strengthened by the declaration in the amended article to the 
effect that certain classes of cases are "generally suitable for sub- 
mission to arbitration." This amendment, however, while it 
may serve as a suggestion to league members who have disputes 
with one another, is distinctly not binding. If it does not desire 
to submit a question to arbitration, it is apparent on the face of 
the article that a nation can avoid doing so by refusing to recog- 
nize it to be "suitable." The article is of no binding force what- 
ever. The covenant would be greatly strengthened and would 
offer much better hope for its future successful operation if it 
provided for the establishment of a court to which questions of a 
judicial nature should of necessity be submitted. 

A method should also be provided whereby the judicial charac- 
ter of the question of dispute may be ascertained either by the 
court or some other appropriate body. Thus it would not be left 
to the decision of the states concerned, who, if they do not wish to 
arbitrate, can always decide that the question is not one of a 
justiciable character. 

Although there is no specific provision on the subject, it is a 
matter of gratification that the language of the covenant is sujQfi- 
ciently broad to enable the council or assembly to undertake the 
important duty of codifying, harmonizing and determining the 
principles of international law to be applied by the court when 
established. Both these bodies are to meet at regular intervals 
and both have jurisdiction over "any matter within the sphere 
of action of the league or affecting the peace of the world." This 
jurisdiction is clearly broad enough so that either body could 
^.gsupie the important and necessary duty of considering ques- 



186 The Annals of the American Academy 

tions of the character mentioned affecting the firm establishment 
and growth of international law. 

Although the framers of the covenant did not see their way 
clear to provide for the immediate establishment of an interna- 
tional court, it is to be hoped and is confidently expected that 
after the conclusion of peace one of the first duties to be under- 
taken by the council will be the establishment of such court 
along the lines of the recommendation made at the second Hague 
Conference. 

While the provisions of the covenant in this regard are not as 
complete as they might be, they offer great hope for the future, 
and it is clear that they impose no restraint upon the freedom of 
action of the United States. Therefore, any objection based 
upon this supposition is without foundation. 

b. Recommendations of the Council or Assembly 

The covenant, although not really requiring the submission of 
any question to judicial decision or arbitration, does undertake 
to require the submission to the council or to the assembly of ail 
questions not submitted to arbitration. The question, therefore, 
arises how far and under what circumstances will a nation be 
bound by the recommendation made by the council or assembly? 
There is no compulsion or restraint of any kind unless the decision 
is unanimous, excluding the parties to the dispute. If the recom- 
mendation is so made, the only compulsion which then rests upon 
the parties involved in the dispute is by virtue of their agreement 
that neither will go to war with the other, if it has complied with 
the recommendation. It is further provided that if either party 
refuses to comply "the council shall propose measures necessary 
to give effect to the recommendation." This last is obviously a 
mere statement that further proposals may be made by the coun- 
cil; there is no agreement by the parties to obey the recommenda- 
tion and no agreement by the other league members that they 
will require them to do so. If there is no unanimous report, the 
only restraint upon the parties to the dispute is to await the 
proper time before beginning hostilities, if they are determined 
to use force. 

It is this article, which has aroused so much discussion and so 
much opposition upon the supposition that it threatens serious 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 187 

interference with questions of domestic policy or with foreign 
poHcies, such as the Monroe Doctrine. As to domestic poHcies 
the matter is dealt with by the amended article, which provides : 

If the dispute between the parties is claimed by one of them and is found by 
the council to arise out of a matter which by international law is solely within 
the domestic jurisdiction of that party the council shall so report and shall make 
no recommendation as to its settlement. 

In case, therefore, a domestic question is involved in a dispute, 
such as, for example, the policy of a state regarding immigration, 
it will not be considered by the council if it finds the question to be 
one solely within the domestic jurisdiction of either party. This 
decision must be unanimous to be effective, but if not unanimous, 
and the council proceeded to consider the case, the member of the 
council who found that the question was of a domestic character, 
would undoubtedly refuse to agree to the recommendation as 
being beyond the jurisdiction of the council. It seems clear 
that if a question is one which can fairly be said to be of a domestic 
character, and if one member of the council finds that it is of such 
character, there will be no unanimous recommendation, and 
therefore no compulsion regarding that matter. It is therefore 
evident that there is no danger of domestic questions being inter- 
fered with under the terms of the amended covenant. 

A clause is also included in the amended treaty which is in- 
tended to exclude cases involving the Monroe Doctrine from con- 
sideration by the council. This is in the form of a separate article, 
which reads as follows: 

Nothing in this covenant shall be deemed to affect the validity of international 
engagements such as treaties of arbitration or regional understandings like the 
Monroe Doctrine for securing the maintenance of peace. 

If it be admitted that the covenant endangers the Monroe 
Doctrine, it must be confessed that the provisions of Article XXI 
do not clearly remove the danger. If it be assumed that the 
validity of the Monroe Doctrine is not affected by anything con- 
tained in the covenant, it does not necessarily follow that the 
doctrine would be recognized and enforced in all cases. For 
example, if Germany should undertake to acquire territory in 
the Western Hemisphere by purchase and the United States 
should object, a dispute would exist, to which the United States, 



188 The Annals of The American Academy 

Germany and the owner of the territory about to be acquired, 
would be parties. The United States would base its objections 
on the ground that the acquisition of the territory would be a vio- 
lation of the Monroe Doctrine and a menace to its safety. The 
provision of Article XXI is not a clear statement that in such a 
case the validity of the Monroe Doctrine would be recognized 
and applied and a decision given against the acquisition of ter- 
ritory by Germany. The declaration that the validity of the 
Monroe Doctrine is not affected by the covenant is not quite 
the same thing as declaring it to be valid and enforceable; nor is 
the mere mention of it by name a sufficient determination as to 
its meaning. The decision might be that the Monroe Doctrine 
could not be considered to apply in the case in hand and that the 
general principles applicable to such cases would not permit a 
just objection by the United States on the ground that its safety 
was imperiled. The amendment proposed by Senator Root, 
whereby the acquisition of territory in the Western Hemisphere 
by European powers would be specifically prohibited, has the 
merit of greater clarity. 

Laying aside the provisions of Article XXI, however, what 
danger is there of interference with the Monroe Doctrine .^^ Under 
what circumstances can it reasonably be said that there is proba- 
bility of a decision which would have the effect of interfering with 
or nullifying the Monroe Doctrine,? A decision of the council, 
to be of any binding effect, must be unanimous, excluding the 
parties to the controversy. As the case can always be taken to 
the assembly, there must be in addition to a unanimous vote of 
the members of the council, a majority vote of the other members 
of the assembly. It is, of course, possible that all the members 
of the council and a majority of the assembly would agree to a 
recommendation which would have the effect of nullifying the 
Monroe Doctrine, notwithstanding the declaration of Article XXI 
that the validity of the Monroe Doctrine is not to be affected by 
the covenant. The probability of such a decision, however, is so 
remote that under all the circumstances it may reasonably be said 
to be negligible. 

It has been argued, however, by some opponents of the league 
that no questions of general policy or involving the vital interests 
of the United States (and this would include questions affecting 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 180 

the Monroe Doctrine) should in any event be submitted to the 
council for examination. No precise effort has been made to define 
the class of cases meant, but it is broadly claimed that the United 
States should reserve to itself the right to determine all important 
questions of this kind and that it should not permit them even to 
be discussed by an international council. Strangely enough 
this argument has been advanced by persons who at the same 
time assert that they are in favor of a league of nations that would 
assist in preserving the peace of the world. It is apparent almost 
without discussion that a contract to submit questions to a court 
or council for examination, but reserving the right to refuse to 
submit an undefined class of cases involving the vital interests or 
important policies of the nations signing the contract would be of 
no binding force whatever. In the not-remote past general 
treaties of arbitration concluded between states generally reserved 
therefrom questions affecting the vital interests, independence or 
honor of the contracting parties. Such a treaty is of no binding 
force, as experience has shown. If a state does not wish to arbi- 
trate it may escape the obligation of the contract by asserting 
that the question affects its honor, its vital interests or its inde- 
pendence. It would be quite useless to make any covenant at 
all if the states were to reserve from the consideration of the court 
or the council an undefined class of cases to be determined by 
themselves. 

Admitting that there is a possibility that the council or assem- 
bly will in important cases affecting the vital interests of the 
United States make decisions unfavorable to the United States, 
the question is whether the United States should, under these 
circumstances, become a party to this covenant. On the one 
hand are to be considered the great advantages resulting from the 
institution of legal relations between states, with consequent 
greater security to the United States as well as to the other nations 
of the world. There are also to be considered the many advan- 
tages naturally flowing from this condition; greater freedom of 
commerce, the lessening of the burden of taxation incident to the 
maintenance of military establishments, and other matters of the 
same character. But even more important than these is the fact 
that the new order would go far toward removing the probability 
of war and establishing international relations on a basis of right. 



190 The Annals of the American AcADEMt 

As against these great advantages what is the danger to the 
United States? Only this — that there might be an interference 
with some policy or with some desired object, which, however, 
could only take place by a concurrence of the following circum- 
stances : 

1. That we should have a dispute with another nation which 
we could not settle by negotiation. 

2. That after we had refused arbitration the case had been 
submitted to and examined by the council and by the assembly, 
and a report made, concurred in by all members of the council 
and a majority of the assembly, recommending a course of 
action unfavorable to the contention of the United States. 

3. That this recommendation was satisfactory to our opponent 
in the dispute and that it complied with it. 

4. That in order to maintain its policy, it would be necessary 
for the United States to take up arms against its opponent, which 
would be a violation of the covenant, and, therefore, the United 
States would find itself unable to do so because of its contract. 

If the facts were such that the United States could still main- 
tain its position without taking up arms, it would be under no 
obligation to obey the recommendation and there would be no 
interference with its rights — ^unless the other nations should, after 
consultation, decide to take steps to enforce the recommendation. 
This, by the very terms of the covenant, would require a further 
consideration and a further agreement, as there is no obligation 
in the covenant to do it. 

The terms of the treaty in this regard have been thus analyzed 
to show how exceedingly remote is the probability that there 
would be any interference with any reasonable policy of the 
United States. It is improbable that any question would come 
up that we could not settle by negotiation, or if we could not 
settle, and refused to arbitrate, that a unanimous recommendation 
of the council would be made against us; or if by maintaining our 
position we could defeat the recommendation of the council, that 
measures would be undertaken to coerce us, especially in the 
absence of agreement to take this course. 

But admitting that all these unlikely conditions might come to 
pass, should not the United States be willing to trust, to this 
extent at least, to the reasonableness and fair-mindedness of the 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 191 

representatives of the other nations of the world? It should be 
recollected that they will propose to put themselves in the same 
position as ourselves. They have many more policies likely to 
clash with the interests of other powers, than we have. They 
have interests to guard which are as sacred as our own. If 
they are willing, for the sake of greater security in the world and 
for the advancement of civilization, to agree to take the risk of 
the judgment of their fellows, under the circumstances indicated, 
we should be willing to do the same. 

The idea of a league of nations is not new. We who live in 
Pennsylvania take a special pride in the fact that William Penn 
proposed a very similar association of nations in the pamphlet 
which he published in 1693. But a league embodied in a treaty 
seriously proposed to be signed by the principal powers of the 
world is new and a marvelous stride forward in the progress of 
civilization. Such a proposal always has its protagonists and its 
antagonists, and the present is no exception. There are those 
who hail it as a great event — ^which it is — and who are disposed 
to accept it without examination. There are those who oppose it 
as a most dangerous innovation, find nothing good in it, magnify 
the errors of draftsmanship and possible dangers, and even affect 
to believe that American independence is threatened. This is not 
the way to discuss a proposal of this kind. It should be exam- 
ined carefully, but not hypercritically; sympathetically, but not 
with the determination to see nothing wrong in it. In a word, 
common sense should be used in the discussion over the League of 
Nations as well as over the more common affairs of life. 

So examined, what do we find? For the first time in the history 
of the world the principal nations have put in the form of a docu- 
ment a proposal that they should combine together in the effort 
to preserve better order in the future and to avoid a repetition of 
the awful experience through which the -world has just passed. 
Considering the number and character of the nations which have 
expressed a willingness so to combine, this of itself is an event 
of the first magnitude. No super-state is proposed, but a mere 
agreement among sovereign states in the interest of a better world 
for all of them. There is no proposal to take away their liberty 
of action, but to protect them in the natural and inherent right 
they now have to live their own lives and work out their national 



192 The Annals of the American Academy 

destinies without the constant menace and threat of attack which 
many of them have endured so long. The principal method 
proposed to accomplish this end, which all must approve, is a 
restraint upon all nations, forbidding them to fight until they have 
submitted their cause to examination and delay. No one can 
question the wisdom of this provision. No one can doubt the 
duty of the United States to join in it and be bound by it. It 
would be no restraint upon the United States, because we would 
always do this in any case, or we would belie our history. No one 
can doubt that the enforcement of examination and delay would 
greatly tend to prevent war. It might not always succeed, but the 
probabilities are that it would. It is highly improbable that any 
interference with the just policies of the United States would result. 
There are some defects in the covenant, but there is no great 
danger in it. When carefully analyzed, the dangers which loom 
so large when proclaimed from the public platform, either disap- 
pear altogether or become negligible in character. Even admit- 
ting their presence, they are not to be considered, as against the 
beneficent effect which the adoption of this covenant would have 
in lightening the burden of armaments and freeing the world from 
the scourge of war. 

If this covenant as amended is accepted by the other powers 
negotiating at Paris, it is unthinkable that it should be rejected 
by the United States. The United States, throughout its entire 
history, has sought to be, and has been in a very real sense, the 
leader in the cause of peaceable international settlements. Not 
only has it shown a willingness to submit its cases to examination 
and decision, but it has urged this course upon others. The occa- 
sions upon which presidents and secretaries of state and other 
officers, and the Congress of the United States and the legislatures 
of the various states have urged upon the world the acceptance 
of the principle of arbitration of international disputes could 
scarcely be enumerated in this paper. If the country which has 
made such great profession in this great cause should refuse to 
follow where the military powers of Europe lead, it would be the 
darkest spot on her history. 

But there is no danger that this will be the result. Even the 
most severe critics of the League of Nations are now prefac- 
ing their remarks by the statement that they are in favor of a 



Amended Covenant of League of Nations 193 

league, and their prophecies of evil if this covenant is adopted, 
are becoming less and less insistent. The covenant in deference 
to the objections has been amended according to the best judg- 
ment of the men who are at Paris earnestly endeavoring to bring 
about a just and permanent peace, and the United States will not 
refuse its approval. 



14 



America, the Nations and the League 

By Hon. Thomas R. Marshall 
Vice-President of the United States 

/^NE of the marvels to me has been the absolute inerrancy with 
^-^ which so many men in America were able immediately 
upon the receipt of the first draft for the proposed League of 
Nations to announce authoritatively what it would and would not 
do to the republic. 

Having spent three and thirty of the best years of my life in the 
practice of the law, during which constitutional cases not infre- 
quently arose, I ascertained that a century and a quarter after its 
adoption by the several states, the American Constitution pre- 
sented many propositions about which strong arguments could be 
made on both sides. For six years, as presiding officer of the 
United States Senate, I have heard this same Constitution lauded 
and magnified, attacked and defended. Propositions prove to be 
clearly constitutional and equally unconstitutional until, in the 
larger, swifter movements of these epoch-making times, I have 
almost reached the conclusion that what one believes is constitu- 
tional and what one disbelieves is unconstitutional. 

Without having made a public utterance upon this proposed 
league, I went to the Salt River Valley of Arizona where, far 
removed from the shouting and the tumult of the captains, I 
might bring to bear upon the subject such reason, patriotism and 
conscience as I possessed. 

With those who are opposed to any league of nations, no differ- 
ence what the terms of its covenant may be, I have no controversy 
nor do I care to charge them with impure and unpatriotic motives. 
Much that they say about the ancient glory of the republic appeals 
to me, both historically and racially. If among the hundred mil- 
lions of people who now dwell under the supposedly protective 
folds of the American flag, there be aside from the Indian such 
a person, racially speaking, as an American citizen, then I am he. 
On both sides of my house, there does not course in our veins a 
single drop of blood which was not coursing in the veins of some 

194 



America, the Nations and the League 195 

man or some woman here in this western continent when Bunker 
Hill became the highest peak in political geography. 

If mere selfishness were to guide my conduct, I would be one of 
the first to raise the cry, "America for Americans." I am one of 
the bare half -million of like lineage now living in this land. My 
blood having fought its way out of English domination under 
George III could never contemplate skulking back as a prodigal 
son under George V. And regardless of that sense of loyalty and 
that personal devotion which I bear to my chief, I would be a last- 
ditch man in the maintenance of American institutions if I thought 
or could be convinced that the proposed League of Nations was 
to make of America a mere appanage of the British Crown. I am, 
however, convinced that there is a vast deal of difference between 
going back a prodigal son and going back, as I believe, not as a 
weakling but as a controlling partner in a great movement looking 
toward the peace of the world. To say that because I have 
whipped a man I will never have anything to do with him save to 
whip him again is primitive. Men learn to forgive — ^nations 
should. To say that I will deal only with an ambitious man 
when he does what I want done is to announce anew the Germanic 
political philosophy. 

I have been pointed to the advice of the Father of the Republic 
to beware of all entangling alliances with European nations. At 
first blush it seems to be conclusive of the subject, but the more I 
consider it the less potency it seems to have in present day affairs. 
It will not do to construe language other than in the light of the 
circumstances under which it was uttered. Somewhere in the 
numerous "Lives" of George Washington, I have read that a 
gentleman would ride nothing save a good saddle horse. This 
advice does not seem to have had any effect upon the manufacture, 
sale and use of motor cars. It must not be forgotten that when 
Washington uttered his advice the status for peace or war of 
each nation of Europe was fixed by a small and ruling class. If 
I were convinced from my reading that the politics of Europe now 
were the product of the policy of politicians and not of peoples, I 
should be willing blindly to follow his advice. It is quite easy 
to assert what a man whose lips are closed in death would say, 
yet I venture to state that Washington was so great a lover of 
peace and of democracy that if, without violation of our Consti- 



196 The Annals of the American Academy 

tution, he could today advise an alliance with the democratic 
peoples of the old world to preserve peace he would do so. 

In the revised draft, the Monroe Doctrine has been taken care 
of. Agitation concerning it was a "tempest in a teapot." There 
were two conclusions drawn from the Monroe Doctrine, one of 
which was good for the American people and the other of which 
was bad. The conclusion that it was the doctrine of self-defense 
against the aggression of European nations on the western shore 
was good, but the doctrine conferring upon us a lordship or guard- 
ianship of our sister republics to the south was distinctly bad. It 
wounded the pride of these republics and instead of drawing them 
toward America it furnished reason for them to listen to the insid- 
ious wiles of European diplomacy. When all men pledge their 
honor to maintaining the integrity of the American republics, it 
is hardly needful for the United States to assume for itself the dis- 
charge of that duty. 

This is not a question of what you and I wish were the case; it 
is a question of what is, and what we are going to do about it. 
Theoretically, I would quarantine against yellow-fever, but if I 
found the epidemic raging in America I would not rely upon the 
quarantine — I would treat the disease. 

Stripped of explanatory verbiage and clarified as to non-legal 
phrases, the objects of the proposed league are to prevent war, 
promote peace, reduce armaments, control the sale of munitions, 
abrogate secret treaties, preserve territorial integrity from external 
aggression, and to help weak and struggling peoples toward the 
maintenance of democracies. 

To attain these objects all disputes which the parties recognize 
as suitable and which are unsettleable by diplomacy shall be set- 
tled by arbitration and in time by a permanent court of interna- 
tional justice; nor shall the parties go to war over any other dis- 
pute until after arbitration or recommendation upon the subject. 

Enforcement of decrees is to be had by severing financial, 
commercial and personal relations with the offending state and 
by recommendation as to actual physical force to be employed. 

In the event of disputes, non-member states are to be invited to 
obey the rules of the league. If the dispute is between a member 
state and a non-member state, a refusal by the non-member state 
to obey the rules of the league constitutes an act of war, but as 



America, the Nations and the League 197 

between non-member states subjects them to such action as the 
council shall deem necessary to avoid war. 

Armament is to be fixed and not increased without permission, 
and private manufacture of munitions and their sale is to be con- 
trolled. 

Provision is made for the recording of all treaties before they 
become effective and the league's power is pledged to the preserva- 
tion of territorial integrity from external aggression. 

I omit the mandatory clause because it is clearly optional and 
not compulsory, and the labor clause as being simply advisory. 

This is in substance the original draft. One serious objection 
which I had to the original draft has been entirely removed in the 
revised draft by the inclusion of the right of a state to withdraw. 
This I think was necessary in accordance with the make-up of 
human nature. The seventeenth century could not fix the politi- 
cal status of the eighteenth, nor can the twentieth century defi- 
nitely fix the political status of the twenty-first. The addition was 
advisable, not on account of objection to the terms of the league, 
but by reason of the inadvisability and impossibility of one genera- 
tion speaking definitely as to what the next must do. 

No one has yet shown me that there is a single word or sentence 
in the proposed league that is in derogation of our Constitution or 
that infringes upon the rights of the Congress of the United States. 
If there were a definite clause that bound the Congress and the 
United States to guaranty by force of arms the territorial integrity 
of any people it might be a valid objection. This objection, how- 
ever, coming from those who with bland countenances voted to 
disregard our guarantee of the territorial rights of Columbia in 
the Panama Canal, does not convince me that the objectors are 
more patriotic than political in their zeal. 

Among all the memorabilia of the war the most remarkable is 
the letter written by Von Bethmann-HoUweg in 1913. In the 
course of the letter he makes in substance this somewhat startling 
statement: "Force has never been able to maintain what force 
has won." Babylon, Nineveh, Troy, Rome, Berlin — all are cov- 
ered with the ashes of destiny and defeat. More and more it 
becomes apparent that thought rules the world and that words 
and ideas are the only things that live forever. For the main- 
tenance of stable government, it is needful that some men who 



198 The Annals of the American Academy 

advocate violence should be punished, because they are seeking 
only to impress their ideas by force. We should never forget 
that we cannot execute an idea nor imprison a thought. 

Lover of the old-fashioned neutrality of the American people, 
I have sought to take a bird's-eye view of my country's history. 
Some men will be mean enough to say that it is a small bird and a 
small eye — ^nevertheless, 'tis mine. 

Neutrality cannot be maintained successfully by a lack of 
resort to physical force. My next-door neighbor and his wife may 
spend their days and nights in family quarrels. So long as they 
are nothing to me and to my wife, so long as we do not seek to 
know the origin of their dispute nor to endeavor to ascertain the 
right and wrong of it, just so long we are neutral. But if she hap- 
pens to be my cousin or he happens to be my wife's cousin, or 
without any relationship whatever we begin to inquire into the 
origin and right of the controversy, we are no longer neutral. We 
have developed a neighborhood quarrel. 

Now it so happens that a majority of those who are vehemently 
attacking the proposed league of peace are the authors of that 
course of conduct which took the American people from their iso- 
lated position and set them down in the politics of ,the world. 
When we accumulated Hawaii, Porto Rico and the Philippines, 
our quarantine clause ceased to work. Eliminating also the half 
million of so-called original Americans, we have opened our gates 
to every kindred, tribe and tongue on earth. I make no com- 
plaint. I have no protest as to their being here, but we were in 
the European war long before the declaration. We would not 
listen to our President to keep still about it. We were pro-ally or 
pro-German in less than a year. 

It was inevitable that we should get into the war, for the very 
soul of America is an intense passion for peace and an intense 
hatred for wrong. Large numbers of those who are now opposing 
the League of Nations are the intellectual descendants of those 
men who characterized the Constitution of the United States as 
"a covenant with death" and "a league with hell," and who 
advised to let the erring sisters go in peace. But the soul of 
America would not let them go in peace. 

Disguised as the issue was, it was not loss of territory which 
caused the destruction of slavery. The Spanish- American war 



America, the Nations and the League 199 

was not over the sinking of the Maine; it was in the cause of 
human liberty in Cuba. Ostensibly we went to war with Ger- 
many for the sinking of the Lusitania and other outrages of the 
sea; in reality, the soul of America had demanded that the world 
be made safe for democracy. 

League or no league, no grave crisis can arise anywhere around 
the world that this people will not seek to know the facts and to 
form an opinion upon them, and when their opinion is formed and 
expressed, the neutrality of the American people is gone. Had 
the American people had a cohesive thought upon this late war 
before it began, it is questionable whether it ever would have 
arisen; and if it had, it speedily would have ended. 

I hope the United States will remain on the side of the Allies. 
I hope our people will always be trained to the idea of justice — 
not force — as the ruling power of the world. I hope they will 
ally themselves in some honorable way with like governments 
around the world so that everyone in America will cease to regret 
the loss of the German cause and that those who formerly believed 
in the German theory will begin to train their children in the prin- 
ciples of democracy. If we step back to our isolation we shall 
have two factions teaching contending theories of government in 
the country. I prefer to have only one faction and that faction 
teaching the cause of democracy and justice. 

Just one more reason and I have done. I am for this League 
of Nations in the hope that, having made the world safe for 
democracy, we can now address ourselves to the task of making 
democracy safe for the world. He who seeks the peace of the 
world must compromise between his opinion and public opinion. 
He must remember Goethe's saying that no government is as bad 
as no government at all. 

This startling thing called bolshevism is as great a menace to 
democracy as was the German military system. I do not accuse 
all men who advocate it as being bad men, but I do say they are 
mistaken men. All my life I have fought the efforts of business to 
run the machinery of government. I shall certainly raise my 
protest against the machinery of government being used for the 
doing of such business as a class of citizens may think ought to be 
done — all other business to be taboo or destroyed. 

Bolshevism may come the world over, but it will be like the 



200 The Annals of the American Academy 

influenza — it may kill its millions, but sooner or later it will pass 
away. I beg the good men who believe in it to stop and consider. 
They might ordain that among the feathered tribe of the world 
only blackbirds should survive and they might exterminate all 
others, but in some far-off distant year their descendants on a 
bright October morning would hear the shrill cry of the quail or 
upon balmy nights listen to the throaty notes of the nightingale. 
If they are themselves fathers of children they need only look at 
their own families to realize that, much as they may believe in the 
political equality of mankind, they cannot produce a social, 
economic, intellectual and moral quality that vWill endure. The 
laws of evolution and the evolutions of God will in due season 
overrule. To meet this menace the less change there is Jn consti- 
tuted authority the better for the world. 

Briefly in conclusion, upon the subject of world predomina- 
tion — ^if my view coincides with the facts of history — then ideas 
and aims, not arms or armament, shall rule the world. Take the 
history of your own, proud people. Read all its glorious past, and 
answer me — ^not as partisan, not alone as patriot, geographically 
speaking, but as a lover of humanity — do you doubt that if our 
aims continue to be as they have been that the American flag will 
drape the throne of the nations? That we shall rule the world 
with a rod of love and in our right hand carry gentle peace to 
silence envious tongues? 



In Defense of the League of Nations 

By Hon. Gilbert M. Hitchcock 
Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate 

TT is a remarkable fact that during all the progress of civilization 
■*^ and the development of national life, the world has heretofore 
been organized for war. Every nation in the world has devoted a 
large share of its revenue and levied a large part of its taxes, not for 
the purpose of promoting the welfare of the people, not for the 
purpose of advancing their education, not for the purpose of de- 
veloping the resources of the country, not for the purpose of 
improving the standard of living, but for the horrible purpose of 
making war on other countries, and in many cases seeking their 
conquest. Now, for the first time in the history of the world a 
serious effort is being made to do away with the old organization 
and in its place to establish an organization of the world for peace. 
For the first time also in the history of the world, the thought of 
every nation is directed to one issue; the thought of all countries is 
focused upon one great struggle. In times past one nation has had 
one great issue that it has busied itself with, and another a different 
one, but now fourteen nations at least have united on one purpose 
and have been actively engaged in negotiating with each other in 
Paris for the purpose of devising a means by which the world 
hereafter shall be insured international justice and world-wide 
peace. To me it is a glorious spectacle; to me it seems as though 
we, born in one age of the world, are to pass into another epoch and 
die in a better age. It seems to me that a new era has come to the 
world, just as much as when Christianity came, just as much as 
when the dark ages were swept away, just as much as when 
chivalry came into Europe to refine and advance the development 
of the people. We, who have lived in the past, have lived in an 
age of war. If this great enterprise now going on in Paris, under 
the leadership of the United States, succeeds, we are to pass into a 
new era of the world, which histories will record as a new era — the 
climax of civilization. It is an inspiring thought, and one which 
may well absorb the attention of the civilized world. 

Probably less progress has been made in the last five hundred 

201 



202 The Annals of the American Academy 

years in the direction of improving government than has been 
made in almost any of the other activities of the world. The 
world has advanced less in the devices of a national government, 
and certainly in the devices of international government. Take 
for example the advances in surgery, during our own day, that 
have revolutionized the science. Not long ago, surgical opera- 
tions were performed without anesthetics. Formerly surgery was 
almost butchery ; now it has become a great science. 

The fastest method of transportation was once the horse, but 
transportation has been developed so that it has now become a 
lightning-like proceeding. First steam and then electricity, steam 
boats and railroad trains, automobiles and flying machines — an 
enormous advance, a perfect revolution in the methods of trans- 
portation. In the United States we have seen performed veritable 
miracles in manufacture. We have seen machines developed 
which have done the work of a hundred men. We have seen 
machines installed in factories which have enabled the factory 
instead of doing the work of a hundred men to do the work of ten 
thousand men. When I went into the newspaper business type 
was set by hand. The idea of setting type by machinery seemed 
like the art of flying — just a foolish figment of the imagination. 
Now type in newspapers is set by machines. Newspapers in all 
their departments have been revolutionized. The newspaper, 
instead of being a concern with an editor and a few writers, circu- 
lated among a constituency of a few thousand, now goes out to its 
hundreds of thousands and in some cases to its millions of sub- 
scribers almost before the ink is dry. It is not very long ago since 
men plowed fields with crooked sticks, but now agriculture is 
almost all done by machinery, and the United States with over a 
hundred million people is able not only to raise all its own food, 
but a large share of the food of the world as well. Science has been 
made the hand-maiden of agriculture. It is not long ago when the 
fastest communication was mail by railroad train. Then commu- 
nication came by the Morse system of telegraphy. Next the 
telephone came in and now wireless telegraphy and the wireless 
telephone. 

In other words, man seems to have made tremendous advances 
in all of the activities of life involving individual enterprise, but 
when it comes to government, up to the time of the outbreak of 



In Defense of the League of Nations 203 

this war, nations were almost where they were centuries ago. 
Things have happened in this late war which would have shamed 
the savages of a thousand years ago. The question, therefore, 
arises whether we can now make a great advance in government. 
We made one great advance in government, when this Republic 
was founded. It has had a powerful influence all over the world. 
It has helped very largely to make the whole world democratic. 
The fight which our forefathers made for independence and for 
liberty, liberated England as well. The example which we set 
made the French Republic possible. Everywhere in the world 
today governments have come practically into the hands of the 
representatives of the people. Nevertheless, in our own country 
we have not altogether made government a success. City gov- 
ernment in the United States today is almost a scandal. Taxation 
also is one of our great unsolved problems. The time has come 
when men may well turn their attention to reforming government. 
But the great pending question is a reformation of the relations 
between governments. It is now proposed to organize the world 
for peace. I would not claim that this could have been done 
heretofore at any time in the history of the world. As long as 
there existed in the world great conquering empires controlled by 
autocrats the idea of a covenant between the nations to preserve 
peace was probably a vain hope. The world has been cursed 
with such empires, but when the war broke out in Europe prac- 
tically only three of them remained. One was the Russian 
Empire, another the German Empire, and the third the Austro- 
Hungarian Empire. They were all controlled by autocrats prac- 
tically having the power for war or peace. Conquest was their 
national aspiration. As long as they existed it was almost impos- 
sible to make a contract between the nations of the world to pre- 
serve peace. But those great empires have gone forever. What 
was once impossible has become possible and the democracies 
now controlling the world can just as easily make a covenant with 
each other to preserve the peace of the world, as people associated 
in any country can enter into such an arrangement. This can be 
done and it is done in the great document which has now been 
perfected in Paris. It is done without surrendering any part of 
the sovereignty of the United States or of any other nation that 
enters into it. 



204 The Annals of the American Academy 

The League of Nations is not a government. It has no sover- 
eign powers. It is a contract between sovereign powers in which 
they agree to do and not to do certain things under given circum- 
stances. They promise each other when they enter into it that 
if a dispute arises between any members they will submit that dis- 
pute to arbitration, or if they do not submit it to arbitration they 
will submit it to an inquiry of the nine nations, composing the 
executive council, and during the period of arbitration or during 
the period of inquiry covering six months, they solemnly agree 
that they will not go to war and they further agree they will not 
go to war for at least three months after that time. So, no matter 
what the result of arbitration is, or what the result of inquiry is, 
the world is assured a cooling off period of nine months before there 
can be any possibility of war. That cooling off period will pre- 
vent nine tenths of the wars of the world. If the diplomats of 
Europe could have restrained Germany three days, this last war 
would not have occurred. If they could have restrained the Ger- 
man war-lords for three days Germany would have come to her 
senses and not gone into that war. The cooling off period of nine 
months gives the peace-loving sentiment of the countries oppor- 
tunity to assert itself and come to the front. Nine-tenths of all 
the wars of the world have sprung, as this last war did, suddenly 
into operation. That cooling off period of nine months will prac- 
tically wipe out nine-tenths of all wars. If, however, a nation 
violates that promise and goes to war within the nine months 
against another member, that act is an act of war against every 
member of the league and involves automatically that every 
other nation will at once dissolve commercial, financial and social 
relations with the offending nation and establish a boycott power- 
ful enough to bring any nation to terms. There is not a nation 
in the world, except the United States, that could withstand a boy- 
cott of all the other nations. Germany was brought to time by a 
boycott of only a few nations, when she was still doing business 
with the neutral nations that adjoined her. Therefore, the pen- 
alty for breach being so severe, it is almost certain that the 
promise not to go to war for nine months will be kept and will do 
away with nine-tenths of the wars. 

Another cause of war in the past has been the negotiating of 
secret treaties. The nations which enter this league agree that 



In Defense of the League of Nations 205 

they will do away with secret treaties, that hereafter all treaties 
shall be open. That gives another assurance of peace. 

The private manufacture of arms and ammunition for profit is 
yet another cause of war. That is put under the supervision of 
the League of Nations and is to be strictly limited. What has 
caused all the revolutions in South America and Central America? 
Profiteering in arms in the United States. How have the wars 
in the Balkans been supported? Because Germany, France and 
Great Britain and other nations of Europe have permitted their 
private manufacturers to sell arms and ammunition to those half- 
developed countries to carry on their wars. So the League of 
Nations in its organization seeks to prohibit those acts which 
have produced the wars of the past. 

The League of Nations is not a government — it is a contract 
between governments, and who shall say that this contract, these 
promises, which these governments make to each other are not to 
be kept? The day is past when a nation will hold a treaty or a 
promise to be a scrap of paper. This war was fought to demon- 
strate that a treaty is not a scrap of paper, but is the solemn word 
of a nation and must be lived up to. As long as the nations which 
enter this League of Nations live up to the treaty which they 
make and the covenants which they sign, there cannot be any 
war, because the promises are so drawn that if kept they will 
make war virtually impossible. 

Some amendments have been suggested, as was obviously neces- 
sary, to clarify the document, but they were really, with one excep- 
tion, involved in the very terms and discussion of the document 
when it was drawn. It is a treaty. Therefore, any nation can 
withdraw from it at any time upon a reasonable notice, but in order 
to make it specific this amendment was inserted — that the notice 
should be a two-year notice. It is a covenant between cooperating 
nations and can only operate when the nations unanimously agree. 
Therefore, no nation can be out-voted to its own detriment. We 
have been told that the United States was going into a combine in 
which it was likely to be out-voted by the other nations and perhaps 
ruined, but when we realize that all the great decisions of the 
league, all the great decisions of the executive council, must be by 
agreement that is unanimous, we see there is no chance for the 
United States or any other ijatioij to be out-voted. The league 



206 The Annals of the Ameeican Academy 

is built upon the theory of continuing good-will and common 
interest. It is built upon the theory that back of the men who 
represent the nations in the executive council are the people in all 
the nations. It is built upon the theory that the world has en- 
tered a new stage, and instead of being governed by force, it is 
going to be governed by public opinion. 

Some of the criticisms of the league, in my opinion, have not 
been in good faith. It is not a partisan question. The great 
fight for it is led, and necessarily led, by the President of the 
United States. He has the backing of Congress. Congress, by a 
vote in both Houses, inserted in the Naval Appropriation Bill of 
1917 an instruction to him at a proper time to call the various 
nations together in conference for the purpose of seeing whether 
or not it would not be possible to organize the world to provide 
international justice and peace. Again, it has the sanction of the 
country because the President, in the midst of the war in January, 
1918, called the two Houses together in joint session and submitted 
to them his message, in which were included his fourteen points, 
and one of those points was the League of Nations ; and the Senate 
and the House arose to their feet with applause when the President 
delivered that message, and the newspapers of the country, with- 
out regard to party, came forward and sounded their praises in 
most unqualified language. The great men of the country, the 
Republicans as well as Democrats, gave it their endorsement, and 
there was not a voice raised even in the Senate or the House 
against the League of Nations for eight months. When it went 
abroad it received the approval of our associate nations, and 
when Germany asked for an armistice she was told that the four- 
teen points constituted the frame-work of an armistice and of 
peace, and she accepted them. Great Britain and France and 
Italy and Japan gave those fourteen points their endorsement, and 
one of the fourteen points was the League of Nations. So, while 
the President of the United States is, as is necessary, leading the 
fight, it is the fight of America to secure a league of nations — 
not his personal fight alone. Great Republican leaders like Wil- 
liam Howard Taft endorse the League of Nations. Our former 
President has brushed aside any possible political or partisan 
gain that he might get by embarrassing his successor. He waived 
his own preferences for his own particular plan of a league and 



In Defense of the League of Nations 207 

courageously^endorsed the^league that_the_President of the 
United States had secured, by joint agreement, with the unani- 
mous consent of fourteen nations. He has helped the President 
with suggestions, just as any friend of this league has done in 
this great emergency, and he is wiser in his day and generation 
than those little partisan members of his party who sought to 
secure a political issue out of the league. They hunted for some 
political gain that they could make out of it. They have sought 
to drag this great issue down into the mire of politics in the hope 
of getting a political issue out of it. The American people, like 
the civilized people of high aspirations in the other nations of the 
world, have made up their minds at least to try this great ex- 
periment. They have made up their minds that when the rep- 
resentatives of the greatest nations of the world come together in 
Paris and unanimously agree to a device to do away with war, they 
want to give their approval to it. They know that they may have 
dijfferent ideas, but it is this league or none. It is now or never. 
This is the great opportunity. If this is rejected, it may be ten, 
thirty, fifty years or longer before another opportunity will come 
to the world. Let us get it when we can. Let us ratify it as the 
Federal Constitution was adopted. Thirteen states in convention 
agreed upon a constitution. Enemies fought it in every one of the 
states. They wanted to amend it — they wanted to change it. 
Why.? Because it did not suit any certain state. It was a com- 
promise, just as this great document is a compromise, but it was 
adopted in spite of opposition and became the greatest govern- 
mental structure of the world. Of course, they have proceeded to 
amend it. That was an agreement from which the states could not 
retire. This is a document from which any nation can retire on 
two years' notice, and if it is amended so as to dissatisfy any na- 
tion, the nation can retire on that account. We go into this as an 
American idea. We go into this as an American proposal. We 
go into this as the crowning efforts of the American Republic to 
better the world, and if it does succeed, it will be to the glory of 
the American Republic that the world has finally adopted a 
method of establishing international justice and peace. 



Wanted: A League of Nations Likely to 
Promote Peace 

By George Wharton Pepper, Esq. 
Philadelphia 

T AM in agreement with those who believe that the nations 
"'■ should set up an international council to promote confer- 
ence and conciliation, to bring nations with divergent interests 
together around a council table under conditions which will 
tend to promote mutual confidence, remove misunderstanding 
and generate an atmosphere out of which peace may grow. I 
am heartily in favor of an international machinery of that sort. 
When in the course of the debates which must come in the Senate, 
and when we have before us the draft which was originally sub- 
mitted to the Peace Conference by President Wilson and his fel- 
low-commissioners, I venture the prediction that that document 
will be found to contemplate a council aimed at conference, at 
conciliation, at diplomatic approach, at publicity, at the abolition 
of secret treaties, at the multiplication of cooling off periods, and 
all the other things which are wholly good and admirable. I 
hazard the surmise that his original draft did not contain the pro- 
vision which is central in the document that is under consideration 
by the country today, namely, the provision for a body which is 
not diplomatic, a council which is not a council of conciliation, 
but an international voting trust of nine nations dominated by 
five, in which there resides far-reaching political power. Such 
a voting trust of nine nations dominated by five, backed by force 
and holding political power in its hands, is far removed from the 
ideals which the President has proclaimed. 

There is one provision in the Constitution of the United States 
which above all the others is the secret of its success. It is the 
provision that the judicial power of the United States shall be 
vested in one supreme court and in such other courts as Congress 
may from time to time establish. Suppose that the Constitution 
of the United States had provided that the judicial power of the 
United States should be vested in the Cabinet of the President. 
What success would have attended our constitutional experiment.'* 

208 



Wanted — A League of Nations 209 

We have a great responsibility. We have to do the thinking on 
this subject; because unless we are impressed with the necessity 
of thinking the less thoughtful people of the country are not going 
to allow the Senate of the United States the time to give unhurried 
consideration to this document. The time to amend it is before 
we go in and not afterwards. While the Constitution of the 
United States can be amended by the action of Congress and of a 
certain percentage of the state legislatures, this document can- 
not be amended save by a majority vote of the many nations of 
the world which are going to be parties to it. 

Under ordinary conditions, when commissioners come back 
from an international conference, bringing the product of their 
conference with them, they take it to the White House and 
lay it upon the table of the Chief Executive and he subjects it to 
calm and judicial review. He calls the Senate to his aid and 
asks their advice and between them they amend the document 
until, in their judgment, it is safe for the interests of the American 
people. I have no disposition to criticize the President in any 
respect whatever; but I wish to point out a single important fact. 
When Mr. President went abroad and became a commissioner, 
he did a thing which it may be was right, it may be was wrong, 
it may be was wise, it may be was unwise. I am not concerned 
with that. But when the commissioner comes back bringing the 
treaty and the constitution with him, he comes back from the 
superheated atmosphere of conference, committed to the docu- 
ment which he brings, with the pardonable pride of joint-author- 
ship; and when the commissioner brings that document to the 
table in the White House he finds the chair of the Executive 
empty. There is nobody there to examine this document judi- 
cially and calmly; and, unless the Senate of the United States is 
called upon to give unhurried consideration to this document, 
the United States will be committed to it in spite of the safe- 
guards of the Constitution of the United States. No man 
should be so much in earnest in his quest of a constitution for the 
world as to be willing to jeopardize the constitutional operations 
of his own government. 

This is the greatest thing that is going to come beforeany of us 
in our time. Let us take it up calmly as a matter of^constitu- 
tional analysis and see where we stand. I use an analogy to 

13 



210 The Annals of the American Academy 

make plain the situation which is before the country today. If 
there were a case of great importance pending in one of the lower 
courts of the United States and the Chief Justice were to step 
down from the Supreme Bench and go into that subordinate 
tribunal, take the decision of the case out of the hands of the 
lower court, decide it himself, and hurry back to the Supreme 
Bench in time to hear the appeal from his own decision, you 
would feel that the judicial machinery of the United States was 
breaking down. And unless the President insists that the 
Senate of the United States shall have a calm and unhurried 
opportunity to consider this document, free from executive 
pressure or popular clamor, it will be precisely as if the Chief 
justice, having returned to the Bench in time to hear the appeal 
from his own decision, had refused to permit associate justices of 
the court to sit with him and participate in the deliberation. 
We cannot have a more serious constitutional situation confront- 
ing us. We are face to face with a civic responsibility which is 
just as great as any in the history of the United States. 

My contention is that we have to amend this document before 
we adopt it, and we have to amend it in a number of vital 
particulars. 

Among others, we have to amend it in respect to what I 
call the international voting trust which is stowed away in the 
body of this document in such fashion that nine nations, dom- 
inated by five, have the ultimate right of final decision, by a 7 to 2 
vote, of every question — ^legal, political, quasi-legal and quasi- 
political — which can arise between any nations of the world and 
which one of the parties to the dispute does not choose to arbi- 
trate. We are told that unanimity in that council is necessary to 
the giving of a final decision. But this is in plain violation of the 
express language of the document, which declares that decision 
shall be final when it is the unanimous decision of the nations rep- 
resented in the council, excluding the parties to the controversy. 
Just as soon as you get rid of the principle of unanimity, and in- 
troduce the principle of majority and minority action, you trans- 
fer your device from the diplomatic conference region into the 
governmental area, and you set up a legislative machine which 
necessarily in deciding against the minority deprives the minor- 
ity of its sovereign powers. 



Wanted — A League of Nations 211 

Moreover, it is provided that whenever either of the parties to 
an international dispute refers the dispute from the council to the 
assembly, the assembly's decision may be final. When it is 
unanimous? No. When it is unanimous but for the parties 
to the controversy? No. When it is unanimous but for the 
parties to the controversy as respects the nations represented in 
the council and then when it is backed by a majority vote in the 
assembly outside of the nations represented in the council. 
Take a practical illustration. A dispute arises between us and 
Great Britain. (Do not think for one minute that in using an 
illustration that concerns Great Britain I wish to appeal to what 
I regard as the ungrateful, unintelligent and perverse attitude 
of many of my fellow-citizens toward Great Britain; I am taking 
it merely as a definite, concrete case within the grasp of all of us.) 
If a dispute under this document arises respecting our protective 
policy, as to whether or not we are according equality of treat- 
ment to the commerce of all nations, what happens? It goes, if 
we do not arbitrate it, automatically to the council of nine. 
If one of the parties then refers it within fourteen days, it goes to 
the assembly. It is now before the assembly for decision. How 
is it going to be decided? You first poll the nine nations in the 
assembly who are represented in the council. You exclude the 
two parties to the dispute — Great Britain and the United States. 
If the seven vote one way on that proposition, you then poll the 
assembly. If a majority of the assembly votes with the seven 
members of the council, the disputants are bound by the deci- 
sion. If the decision is adverse to the United States, we are bound. 
And I challenge a senator of the United States, or a chairman of a 
committee on foreign relations, or a vice-president, or a presi- 
dent, or anybody else, to answer the proposition that when you 
have set up in an international treaty a provision for the majority 
decision of international questions, you have set up a supergov- 
ernment. You have established a governmental body and you 
have bound the parties by covenant to abide by its decision. 
You may quibble about terms; but the substance of the thing is 
there. It jeopardizes the sovereignty of the United States. 
You poll the nine nations. Great Britain, were she not a party 
to the dispute, would have one vote, her Imperial vote in the 
council of nine; but, being a party, she does not vote, Sevei\ 



212 The Annals of the American Academy 

votes are cast in her favor. Subtract the nine from the forty- 
five nations in the assembly and you get thirty-six, of which 
a majority would be nineteen. Great Britain starts with five 
votes toward her nineteen, because her self-governing colonies 
have five votes apart from the Imperial vote. If the issue were 
one in which the fourteen South American countries were favor- 
able to the British view of that controversy. Great Britain's 
vote and the South American vote in the assembly would bind 
the United States. We covenant that we will not go to war 
against the successful disputant who submits to the conditions of 
the decree. You have then an international steam-roller which 
is going to be an engine for the political determination of the 
affairs of the world. It is not the thing which President Wilson 
dreamed of, not the thing he preached, and not the thing for which 
he contended. It is the work of subtle diplomats of the old 
world. It is a clever piece of political machinery designed per- 
petually to control international affairs. I know a voting trust 
when I see it. I have drawn them in my time. It is as clever a 
reorganization voting trust as you ever saw. 

But its advocates blandly say, "Yes, but we have the right to 
withdraw." The right to withdraw from what? You have got 
hold of the tail of the bear and you have a right to let go ! If it is 
going to be a steam-roller we have reserved the right to get out of 
it and stand in the track. It is always safer for the United States 
to be in this thing than out of it. 

They say the Monroe Doctrine is safe-guarded. I could show 
you, if the time at my disposal permitted, that the greatest mess 
is made of the Monroe Doctrine in the 21st Article of this covenant 
that has ever been made by any body that has dealt with this 
subject. 

With regard to the amendments which have been proposed, 
the most friendly and constructive were those which were pro- 
posed by Senator Root. They dealt with the things that are 
essential to the promotion of peace; and the Conference has 
rejected every one of the Root amendments. Every one was 
rejected by the Peace Conference, with the result that the three 
stumbling blocks in the way of promoting peace are perpetuated 
in this document. What are they.? 

The nations have always refused to set up a High Court anti 



Wanted — A League of Nations 213 

refer to it the questions of international law which must receive 
the consideration of a judicial tribunal if the world is to be ruled 
by law and right and not by might. Senator Root's amendment 
on that subject was rejected by the council. 

The second thing which has always placed obstacles in the 
path of peace is the optional character of arbitration. Senator 
Root required by his amendment that the parties should be bound 
to submit to arbitration all justiciable questions — that is, the 
kind of questions that courts among us every day decide. And 
they rejected that. They prefer to send justiciable questions, 
the kind of questions the Supreme Court of the United States 
decides, to the international voting trust, which is an executive 
body, like the President's Cabinet. 

The third obstacle in the way of peace has always been the re- 
fusal to limit armaments. Mr. Root pointed out that under 
this document there is no right on the part of the league to inspect 
the condition of munition manufacture in any nation and no 
right to verify the reports that the nation sends in; therefore 
he proposed an amendment that there should be a right to in- 
spect the condition of munition manufacture and armament in 
each state and a right to verify the returns made by the state. 
And the Conference has turned that down. 

The three things which have always stood in the path of peace 
up to this time are right there — writ large in the body of this 
document which we are asked to accept; and in the center of it is 
the voting trust proposition which gives political power to a small 
group of dominant nations not acting on principles of concilia- 
tion and conference, but just exactly as voting trustees act under 
similar circumstances. 

With regard to Article 10, which is the blanket guarantee of 
territorial integrity and political independence of the nations of 
the world as against external aggression — that stands just pre- 
cisely as it stood in the original draft. It is the provision by 
virtue of which, if we take our obligations seriously, the United 
States will be involved in every war in the future without an 
opportunity to determine on which side she will fight. I am not 
opposed to the United States giving all the guarantees that are 
needed to make the peace which shall be expressed in the Treaty 
of Peace firm, permanent and secure. I am in favor of having 



214 The Annals of the American Academy 

the United States back, with men and money, every specific 
guarantee which is necessary to make the peace treaty effective, 
and the settlements under the treaty reasonably permanent. 
But I am absolutely unwilling to stand by and see the United 
States, without protest, sign its name to a guarantee which is 
blank respecting the obligation, leaving it to the future history 
of the world to fill in the body of that obligation. This thing 
must be amended. It must be amended carefully. It must be 
amended wisely. It must be amended radically. Unless we 
see to it that our representatives in the Senate have the unhurried 
and unpressed opportunity to do that thing, we shall be defaulters 
to our civic responsibility. 



Peace and Democracy 

By Hon. Samuel W. McCall 

Formerly Governor of Massachusetts 

'^^ rE have been side by side with the most civiHzed nations of 
' ' the world in the most colossal struggle, in the most deadly 
war of all history, in a war that has been more expensive probably 
than all the previous wars that have ever taken place. It is 
clearly our duty to do all in our power to prevent any repetition 
of such a tragedy. That is the plain duty before us; and how are 
we going to perform it? 

Are we to have a league of nations, a concert of nations, com- 
pacted together to wage war against war.'' I believe in a league of 
nations. It does not follow that I believe in any league of nations, 
but something of the sort we must have. I believe in debate. 
The Constitution of the United States was adopted after a long 
debate by the ablest men in America. It then went to the con- 
ventions in the thirteen states, where it was again debated. It 
was finally adopted, but it was adopted with very radical amend- 
ments, which are now a part of the document. That debate gave 
us a better Constitution. The formation of a league of nations is 
too vital a question to be settled without discussion. I think that 
the speech for instance made by Senator Philander Knox of Pennsyl- 
vania was the most illuminating speech that has been made upon 
the covenant, and if more such speeches can be made in the Senate 
I trust they will be made. If amendments are needed to improve 
the league they should be made. Undoubtedly the men in Paris 
have profoundly considered the covenant of the league, but they 
have not put it in the crucible of debate. There may be some 
question whether that part of the covenant relating to the Monroe 
Doctrine, in the form in which it now appears, should be sanc- 
tioned. The Monroe Doctrine does not mean simply the guaran- 
tee by the United States of the territorial boundaries of the other 
countries upon this hemisphere. That view overlooks entirely 
the essential political character of the doctrine. Mr. Olney con- 
tended that it contemplated a struggle between monarchical insti- 
tutions and free government. President Monroe and John 

iei5 



216 The Annals of the American Academy 

Quincy Adams put it forth as necessary to our peace and safety 
that the governmental systems of Europe should not be extended 
upon this continent. If it is necessary to safeguard the Monroe 
Doctrine then an amendment should be adopted. But I doubt 
very much whether it is wise for us to guarantee the territorial 
boundaries of all the nations of the world, so that we may have a 
static world. Much of the advance in civilization has come from 
the shifting of the boundary lines of nations. 

The paramount thing is that the covenant is aimed against 
war. We do not seem to comprehend just what war is. We 
are apt to regard it as a struggle in the abstract between 
nations, and we do not get beneath the surface. War, in effect, 
means the offering up of boys in what is called the cause of their 
country. In our Civil war, of 2,800,000 enlistments more than 
2,100,000 were of boys of twenty-one years old and under. It 
was the same in ancient times. After a great war in Athens, 
Pericles said, "The youth perished from the city like the Spring 
from the year," and Plato said that war is a monster that lies in 
wait upon the rich meadow land of generous youth. So it has 
always been. Uncounted millions of boys have been offered up — 
and for what? In this war nearly 10,000,000 boys of the different 
nations of the world have gone to their destruction. Those young 
spirits were beating at the dawn of their careers eager to run their 
race and they were cut off in a war which they did not initiate. 
We want to put an end to the system that is likely every fifty 
years or a hundred years to require the offering up of 5,000,000 or 
10,000,000 of the flower of the youth of the race. It is said that 
men are going to do what^they always have done and that we 
must remain in servitude to the old system of war. But canni- 
balism has gone. Slavery has followed cannibalism, and it seems 
to be an indictment of the statesmanship as well as the humanity 
of the world if we shall permit this system involving the destruc- 
tion of the young men of the world to continue. Therefore, the 
League of Nations as a whole is admirably devised. 

There is somewhere in Paris or Versailles a painting of Louis 
XIV who was all his life engaged in war. He is covered with 
armor and is seated upon a war horse. The picture bears the 
title "Louis the XIV. Bringing Peace to Europe." Happily the 
head of the American nation is really attempting to bring peace, 



Peace and Democracy 217 

not merely to Europe but to the world, and he is appearing in no 
such spectacular and hypocritical attitude. We want to adopt 
some sort of an organization in this present moment to preserve 
the peace of the world. The whole world is ripe for it. The phi- 
losophers of the world, and its poets for the last fifty years have 
been writing about it. There is a public^spirit abroad that^de- 
mands it. 

We cannot establish forms of government in the different na- 
tions, however much we might like to have this country or that a 
republic. Each nation must adopt its own form of government or 
that government will not stand. 

*^-Two years ago when President Wilson spoke of making the 
world safe for democracy, I suggested that democracy also should 
be made safe for the world. I did not intend to criticize what the 
President had said, but I thought that the two ideas should go 
together. Democracy is not a timid weakling. It is not a violet, 
something that is crushed by a breath, but it is a great, strong 
creature with all the power of the combined units of the race and 
it can take anything that it wants. Therefore, the problem is to 
make democracy safe for the world, and in order to do that we 
must endow it with the necessary organs. We must give to this 
formless mass organization and the opportunity to develop 
a considered opinion so that it can be delivered from wild leader- 
ship that will lead it to quick and violent action and make it 
in effect an undisciplined mob. We have seen in Russia and other 
countries some of the things that are done in the name of democ- 
racy but which are a disgrace to it — the wicked crimes that have 
been committed in the name of democracy. The primal thing in 
government is to have the world established upon such a democratic 
basis that this basis shall permit a real expression of the will of the 
people, and everywhere the protection of every man in his rights. 
This was the aim of our Constitution. 

We have something to do in this country with reference to the 
organization of peace in our own internal affairs. In a time of 
war nearly everybody who has a hobby gets it out and rides it. 
We have had things done at Washington by the central govern- 
ment that were unnecessary infringements upon the individual lib- 
erties of the men and women of this country. Let them be charged 
to the war. But now that it is over, let the American people 



218 The Annals of the American Academy 

resume their liberties. Let us get back to the old paths of an 
ordered liberty. Let us have restored again the right of the 
American citizen to stand on his feet. Let us secure him in the 
results of his enterprise and industry. Let us encourage him to 
do those innocent things, which have been done in the past and 
which have resulted in making us a great nation. 

In the international organization of peace we want our League 
of Nations. We want it solidly established. We want it to go 
into force and have effect upon any great crisis that may come 
among the nations of the future. As to our own country, in the 
national organization of peace, we want to establish ourselves 
upon that rock of American liberty which has distinguished us in 
the past, and which has made us an example to all the nations of 
the world. 



Index 



Agrarian situation in Russia, 117. 

America, The Nations and the League. 
Thomas R. Marshal], 194-200. 

American Red Cross in Russia, 124. 

Andrfcsy, Count, 76. 

Andreeff, Leonid, 98. 

Armaments, limitation of, 180, 197, 205, 
213. 

Arabia: adjustment of boimdaries, 17; po- 
litical union, 34; problem of, 5. 

Arbitration, optional character, 213. 

Armenia: mandatory of, 23, 27, 38; prob- 
lem of, 5, 15. 

Armenian Republic, recognition of, 27. 

Armenians, massacres of, 7, 14. 

Asia Minor, history of, 32. 

Assembly: decisions of, 211; recommenda- 
tion by, 186. 

Austria-Himgary: collapse of, 74; relations 
with Serbia, 53, 67. 

"Backward nations," 156. 

Bagdad Railway, internationalization of, 

26, 38. 
Balkan League, break up, 31. 

peninsula, geography of, 71. 

war, 53. 

Belligerents, rights of, 163, 166. 

Berne Conference, The, 96. 

Blockade, right of, 169. 

Boer war, 167. 

Bolshevik formulas, spread of, 134-38. 

party, business relations with, 96, 112. 

Bolshevism: Czarism and, 81; democracy 

and, 102-107; in America, 143; meaning 

and methods, 95; not anarchy, 110. 
Bolshevism, The Menace of. Baron 

Rosen, 98-101. 
Bourgeoisie, The, 129. 
Breshkovsky, Catherine, 107, 136. 
Brest-Litovsk Conference, 141. 
Bhyce, Rt. Hon. James. Foreword, 146. 

Capital, need of, in Turkey, 48. See also 

Foreign, 
Capitalism in Russia, 117. 
Christian population of Turkey, 41. 



Classes in Russia, 92, 127. 

Colored people, rights of, 172. 

Commerce, foreign, 152. 

Communist party, 109. 

Compulsion of league members, 183. 

Confederation: of Turkey, 4; principle of, 
69. 

Congress of Berlin, 65, 76. 

Vienna, 64. 

Constantinople, disposal of, 3, 38. 

Constituent Assembly, need of, 106. 

Constitution: amendments, 147; opposi- 
tion to, 194, 207, 215. 

Continuous voyage, doctrine of, 166-68. 

Contraband, meaning of, 169. 

Cooling off period, 204. 

Cooperative enterprise in Russia, 86, 88. 

Cossack Whip and Sword, 133, 135, 139, 
145. 

Council: decision of, 210; recommenda- 
tions of, 186. 

Court of Equity, High, 157, 160. 

Czarism: and bolshevism, 81; and the In- 
telligentzia, 114. 

Czech tongue, 72. 

Czechoslovak Republic, The — An Ex- 
periment IN Progressive Govern- 
ment. Charles Pergler, 58-63. 

Danube, navigability of, 79. 

Danubian Confederation of the Fu- 
ture, A. V. R. Savic, 70-80. 

Declaration of Independence, 148-9. 

Paris, 163. 

Defeatism, doctrine of, 131. 

Delay before hostilities, 178, 204. 

Demobilization of Russian army, 83. 

Democracy, principle of, 64. 

Democracy and Bolshevism. A. J. Sack, 
102-7. 

Druzes, 21. 

Duggan, Stephen P. Reconstruction 
Among the Small Nations of Middle 
Europe, 64-69. 



Economic cooperation, 125, 140. 
oppression, 123. 



219 



220 



Index 



Economic paralysis, 128-131. 

pressure, 180. 

Economic Force and the Russian Prob- 
lem. Thomas D. Thacher, 121-126. 

Economic Organization of Peace, The. 
Samuel J. Graham, 147-151. 

Education, desire for, 86. 

Eight-hour day law, 60. 

Elkus, Abeam I. Problems in the Recon- 
struction of the Ottoman Empire, 1-5. 

Embargo in Russia, 122, 142. 

England: revolution in industrial life, 174; 
trade, 156. 

Evolution: law of, 103; of small states, 66. 

Exploitation of Turkey, 31. 

Export value of American goods, 154. 

Exports in 1914, 156. 

Faisul, Prince, 16, 18, 28. 

Favorable balance of trade, 154. 

"Fertile Crescent," 32, 35. 

Finland and Poland, 88. 

Fiume, port of, 68, 79. 

Foreign capital, investment of, 157. 

Foreign Trade Policy — Wanted A. 

John Hays Hammond, 152-60. 
Foreword. Carl Kelsey, v. 
Foreword to Part IV. Rt. Hon. James 

Bryce, 146. 
France, claims in East, 4, 5. 
Franklin, Benjamin, 148, 164. 
Freedom of the Seas, The. John H. 

Latane, 161-70. 
French Revolution, principles of, 64. 

George, Lloyd, 113, 122, 126. 

German population in Czechoslovak Re- 
public, 62. 

propaganda in Russia, 130, 138. 

Government: need of advance in, 203; rep- 
resentative, on trial, 150. 

Graham, Samuel J. The Economic Or- 
ganization of Peace, 147-51. 

Great Britain, imperial vote, 211. 

Greece, extension to Asia Minor, 25, 70. 

Greek Catholic Church, 136. 

Grotius, Hugo, 162. 

Grouitch, Madame Slavko. An Eye- 
witness of the Serbian Apotheosis, 51-7. 

Hamilton, Alexander, 148. 



Hammond, John Hays. Wanted — A For- 
eign Trade Policy, 152-60. 

Hedjaz, King of, 17-19, 34. 

Hitchcock, Gilbert M. In Defense of 
the League of Nations, 201-7. 

Hunt, Fred, on Soviet Russia, 110. 

Huntington, W. C. The Russian Trag- 
edy, 90-7. 

Immigration, restriction of, 155. 
Import value, 154. 
Industries in Czechoslovakia, 68. 
Industry, share in proceeds, 151. 
Intelligentzia, rise of the, 93. 
Intelligentzia and the People in the 

Russian Revolution, the. Moissaye 

J. Olgin, 114-20. 
International commissions in East, 37. 

Court, 182-6, 213. 

law between Moslems and Christians, 

10. 
Intervention in Russia, 113, 122. 
Investments abroad, 158. 
Invisible exports, 154. 

Jastrow, Morris, Jr. The Turks and the 
Future of the Near East, 30-40. 

Jessup, Henry W. The Future of the 
Ottoman Empire, 6-29. 

Jews, see Zionist state. 

Jugoslavs: relations with Czechoslovaks, 
72-4; relations with Rumanians, 71. 

Karolyi, Count, 77. 

Kelsey, Carl. Foreword, v. 

Kerensky, Alexander, 94, 95, 139. 

government, 103, 109, 127, 133. 

Knox, Senator Philander, 215. 
Kolchak, dictatorship, 101, 110, 111. 
Kramar, Dr. Charles, 62. 

Labor: in Czechoslovakia, 60; unemploy- 
ment of, 155. 

Land question: in Czechoslovakia, 59; in 
Russia, 108. 

Latane, John H. The Freedom of the 
Seas, 161-70. 

League, America, The Nations and 
the. Thomas R. Marshall, 194-200. 

League of Nations: and freedom of seas, 
169; objects of, 196. 



Index 



221 



League of Nations, in Defense of the. 
Gilbert M. Hitchcock, 201-7. 

League of Nations, the Amended Cove- 
nant OF THE. Thomas Raebum White, 
177-93. 

League op Nations Likely to Promote 
Peace — ^Wanted A, George Wharton 
Pepper, 208-14. 

Lebanon, Christian population of, 22. 

Lenin, Nikolai, 95, 96, 98, 106, 113, 139-41, 
145. 

Lockhart, Bruce, 105, 141. 

Lvov, Prince, 94, 103. 131, 133. 

McCall, Samuel W. Peace and Democ- 
racy, 215-18. 

Magyars, relations with Slovaks, 63, 72-8. 

Manual of Naval Prize Law, 167. 

Markets: foreign, control of, 153; home, 
155. 

Maronites, 21. 

Maeshall, Thomas R. America, The Na- 
tions and the League, 194-200. 

Marx, Karl, 103, 137. 

Marxian socialism, 96. 

Masaryk, President, 61, 73. 

Menshevik party, 95, 134. 

Merchant marine, development of, 160. 

Mesopotamia, organization as separate 
state, 33. 

Mexico, investment of American capital, 
159. 

Middle Europe, Reconstruction Among 
Small Nations of. Stephen P. Dug- 
gan, 64-9. 

Militarism, German: effect on Turkey, 43; 
opposed in Czechoslovakia, 61. 

Mir, village, 87, 133. 

Missions, American, in Turkey, 49. 

Mohammedan Turk, attitude toward non- 
Moslems, 8-10. 

Monroe Doctrine, 187, 196, 212, 216. 

Montenegro, Serbia and, 70. 

Moslem population of Turkey, 41. 

Nationality, principle of, 64-6, 146. 
Nationalization of land, 109. 

women, 96, 143. 

Neutrality, maintenance of, 198. 
Ninety-three per cent mind, 127. 



NuoRTEVA, Santeri. The Soviet Republic, 

108-13. 
Nusairiyeh, 20. 

Obligations imposed on members of league, 

& 178-83. 

Okhrana records, 138. 

Olgin, Moissaye J. The Intelligentzia and 
the People in the Russian Revolution, 
114-20. 

Ottoman empire: population, 1; revised 
constitution, 11. See also Turkey. 

Ottoman Empire, Problems in the Re- 
construction OF THE. Abram I. Elkus, 
1-5. 

Ottoman Empire, the Future of the. 
Henry W. Jessup, 6-29. 

Palestine, western influence in, 35. 

"Parlor bolsheviks," 98. 

Peace, the EcoNoinc Organization of. 
Samuel J. Graham, 147-51. 

Peace and Democracy. Samuel W. 
McCall, 215-18. 

Perm, William, proposal of league of na- 
tions, 191. 

Pepper, George Wharton. Wanted: A 
League of Nations Likely to Promote 
Peace, 208-14. 

Pergler, Charles. An Experiment in 
Progressive Government — ^The Czecho- 
slovak Republic, 58-63. 

Poland and Finland, 88. 

Poles, suppression of, 66. 

Private property rights in Russia, 85. 

Privateering, 163. 

Production: in Russia, 92; market for sec- 
ondary, 143. 

Prohibition, 148. 

Proletariat, the, 97, 140. 

Provisional government: and the Soviet, 
94; failure of, 119; weakness of, 133. 

Publicity of treaties, 180. 

Rasputin, 139. 

Reconstitution of Turkey, 36. 

Reconstruction of the Ottoman Em- 
pire, Problems of. Abram I. Elkus, 
1-5. 

Red Guard, 125, 136. 



Index 



RehabUitation of Russian state, 88. 

Resources, natural, in Russia, 85. 

Revolution of 1905: importance of, 102; in- 
fluence of the Intelligentzia, 115. 

of March, 94, 102, 118. 

Robins, Raymond. Social Control in 
Russia Today, 127-45. 

Root, Senator, amendments to league 
covenant, 183, 188, 212. 

Rosen, Bakon. The Menace of Bolshe- 
vism, 98-101. 

Russia — ^Pbesent and FuTxmE. R. M. 
Story, 81-9. 

Russian character, the, 82, 85, 92. 

peasant, characteristics of, 93, 

Russian Revolution, the Intelligent- 
zia AND the People in the. Moissaye 
J. Olgin, 114-20. 

Russian Tragedy, the. W. C. Hunting- 
ton, 90-7. 

Russo-Japanese war, 132. 

Sack, A. J. Democracy and Bolshevism, 
102-7. 

Salonica, water way to, 80. 

Savic, V. R. A Danubian Confederation 
of the Future, 70-80. 

Serbian Bulgarian war, 53. 

Serbian Apotheosis, an Eyewitness of 
the. Madame Slavko Grouitch, 51-7. 

Serbo-Croatian language, 72. 

Seven per cent mind, 127. 

Slav danger, 75. 

Social Control in Russia Today. Ray- 
mond Robins, 127-45. 

Social Reorganization in America, 
THE Need of. Oswald Garrison Villard, 
171-76. 

Socialism: diflference between bolshevism 
and, 103; formulas of, 136; Marxian, 96. 

Soviet government: confidence of Russians 
in, 87; constructive action. 111; repre- 
sentative, 172. 

in industry, 173. 

structure of social control, 132-34. 

Soviet Republic, the. Santeri Nuorteva, 
108-13. 

State ownership in Russia, 88. 

Story, R. M. Russia — Present and Fu- 
ture, 81-9. 



Syria: adjustment of boundary, 18; prob- 
lem of, 4, 15; western influence in, 35. 

Taft, William Howard, attitude on league^ 

206. 
Tariff: American, 159; England, 156. 
Tchaikovsky, Nicholas, 107. 
Territorial integrity, guarantee of, 181, 213, 

216. 
Thacheb, Thomas D. Economic Force 

and the Russian Problem, 121-6. 
Trade with Russia, restoration of, 126. 
Trade, see also Foreign trade. 
Trans-Siberian Railroad, 84. 
Transportation in Russia, 94. 
Treaties, publicity of, 180, 204. 
Trotzsky, Leon, 139-41, 145. 
Turkey: affect of war on, 46; government 

a liberal monarchy, 2; need of capital, 48; 

poverty, 46. See also Ottoman Empire. 

In Europe, disposal of, 4. 

Turkish character, 9. 

Turkish Empire, the Disposition of the. 

Talcott Williams, 41-50. 
Turks and the Future of the Near 

East, The. Morris Jastrow, Jr., 30-40. 
Tutelage of the East, 37. 

United States In charge of foreign interests 

in Turkey, 12-14. 
mandatory in Near East, 38, 48. 

Villard, Oswald Garrison. The Need 
of Social Reorganization In America, 
171-6. 

Voting trust, international, 208, 210. 

War: as viewed by Intelligentzia, 118; cost 
of, 216; effect in Russia, 83, 94. 

Washington, George, advice of, 174, 195. 

Webb law, 159. 

White, Allen, on the soviet government, 
110. 

White, Thomas Raeburn. The Amended 
Covenant of the League of Nations, 
177-93. 

White guard, 110, 125. 

Willcocks, William, barrages in Mesopo- 
tamia, 34. 

Williams, Talcott. The Disposition of 
the Turkish Empire, 41-50. 



Index 

Wilson, President, attitude on freedom of Young Turkish party, 37. 

seas, 165, on league, 208, 209; on Otto- Yugo-slav, freedom of race, 51-7. 

man empire, 15, 16, 23. 

Withdrawal, right of, 187, 205, 212. Zionist state, establishment of, 22. 

Woman suffrage in Czechoslovak Republic, Zemstvos, 87, 117. 

61. 



INDUSTRIES IN READJUSTMENT 

"The issue of The Annals on 'Industries in Readjustment' covers 
that subject if not thorou^ly at least with a g^ierous recognition of the 
elements that enter a modem conception of industry* It would be difficult 
to single out individual items from this wealth of information and sug- 

The Survey 
Issue of April 5, 19X9 



"I have just finished reading 'Industries in Readjustment/ Permit 
me to add this appreciation of the same. The articles, are timely and 
represent the most recetnt researches of the ablest practical men in the 
present world of finance, eonimerce and industry. It shows that scholar- 
ship is an essential requisite today to achieve success in business adminis- 
tration and direction. It is worthy of a most thorough and exhaustive 
study by every true and loyal American who is a disciple of the doctrine 
of fair play and honesty in business enterprise and commercial develop- 
ment. Personally I consider it the best issue the Academy has published 
since I became a member." 

W.: C. Heffner 

Field-Secretary y Peirce School^ Philadelphia 



THE WORLD'S FOOD 

'Our sense of the great potency of food was highly quickened and 
intensified during the war and we shall continue to realize it as a factor 
second to none in peace times. A volume such as 'The World's Food ' 
is calculated to give an Ultimate knowledge of the elements that enter into 
the apportionment oF foods among the peoples of the world. The ordinary' 
individual who knows of small affairs as they happen day by day under- 
stands little of the larger world processes. The volume m question will 
help to educate him and tell him of the food situation in France, Great 
Britain, South America^ Japan, and otiier countries, besides many details 
concerning food factors m this coimtry, such as marketing plans, studies 
of food prices, the relation of the housekeeper to the food problem, the 
natron's dietary needs, and the hke. The contributors are specially quali- 
fied to treat their respective subjects. They include Charlotte Perkins 
Gilman, Gifford Pinchot, Ambassador Roland S. Morris. Ambassador 
Viscount Kikujiro Ishii, Frangois Monod, of the French High Commission 
to the United States, and a number of experts of the United States, state 
and city governments." 

The American Hebrew 

March 7, 1919 



The volumes mentioned above can be secured from 
The American Academy of Political and Social Science 
i (Price per copy: $1.00 paper; $1.50 cloth) 



' , ^'^ ^>te%^^P^ '".^^'^Sv -?^^ms^-#,v** J a t**^ 



The American Academy 



OF 



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